


No one knows me (not like you do)

by TruFaith



Category: Glee
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 05:23:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 68,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1498234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TruFaith/pseuds/TruFaith
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Quinn gets in a wreck and loses her memory.  Eventually she starts to realize that all these people who claim to be her best friends and ex-boyfriends can't tell her anything real about who she actually is.  Even her parents barely know her.  Enter Rachel Berry, who has always known exactly who Quinn Fabray is.  AU building off of season one that ignores BabyGate completely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Still cross posting old stuff, sorry guys.
> 
> I started writing this between season 1 and 2. And it was one of the first things I wrote so... it gets better. And the paragraphs get shorter. Promise.

 

“There’s a good chance you may never get any of your memories back Ms. Fabray”

You’ve been alive about an hour and you already regret waking up. People keep telling you that you’ve actually been alive a little over 17 years but you don’t think it really counts if you can’t remember any of it. The doctor keeps talking, something about a brain bleed and damaged tissue, but you barely understand half of what he’s saying. Still, you listen attentively and memorize every word because information you don’t even comprehend is better than no information at all. The older couple – Russell and Judith Fabray -, which introduced themselves earlier with an awkward handshake and a very formal “We’re your parents” before pulling their chairs as far away from you as possible, either understands him perfectly or they are quite good at pretending like they know exactly what’s going on. You have a feeling it’s probably the latter.

After a few more minutes and some therapy recommendations Dr. Richard Steinman apologizes for your situation, which you find odd since as far as you know he’s been on the ‘fixing you’ side of things, and leaves the room. Now it’s just you and the Fabrays who seem desperate to follow the doctor out the door. You don’t really want to think about what it means that the only people you know in the entire world have been itching to get the hell away from you since the moment they showed up.

The Fabrays tell you that your name is Quinn Elizabeth Fabray; you’re a junior at McKinley High School, the head cheerleader, and a devout Catholic. You don’t bother telling them that you have no idea what the word cheerleader means or that you can only remember Catholic is a religion but not which one exactly. Words seem to keep getting mixed up and misplaced in your head. According to Dr. Steinman that’s normal for a head injury like yours and usually clears up in a couple of days. That doesn’t stop it from annoying the hell out of you now though. They also tell you that you have an older sister - Sarah Ellen Fabray, 22 – and you get the distinct impression that she’s valued much more highly than you are. You ask how you wound up in the hospital in the first place and they tell you that you irresponsibly totaled their perfectly good brand new SUV. After a few awkward silent minutes you tell them that you’re still tired and going to try and get some more sleep. The relief that washes over their faces isn’t missed.

 

 

***************

 

The second time you wake up you’re almost immediately thrown into a situation that’s terrifying but in the midst of it is the best moment of your entire 6 or so hours of existence. The nurse – Debbie Mathews – is looking at charts and machines when you wake up and tells you that the Fabrays left a while ago, which you were hoping for and completely dreading at the same time, but that a group of your school friends is waiting in the lobby to see you. The last thing you want is to be surrounded by people who you’ve never seen before that knows more about you than you know about yourself. It was awkward enough with the Fabrays and there were only two of them. You’re almost positive this is going to turn out badly but the polite thing to do is let them in and shake hands and try to be friendly. Maybe you are related to the Fabrays after all, putting formality and etiquette over personal comfort. Nurse Debbie goes into the hallway and retrieves a dozen or so people – 11 teens and an adult after further examination – and you’re suddenly surrounded by chaos. Everyone is talking to each other, making jokes or arguing and the older man seems to be eavesdropping on everyone and randomly inserting himself into conversations. Something about him doesn’t quite sit right and you can’t fathom why he’s even here with all these kids. He catches your eye and gives you an odd grin that sets your teeth on edge. You’re starting to panic. You don’t know these people and they are all very loud and very close to you and there’s so much going on that you can’t seem to process any of it. They keep saying things you don’t understand and then looking annoyed when you don’t respond as expected. You’re feeling completely overwhelmed and about to scream for everybody to please shut the hell up and kindly get the fuck away from you when you see her. Standing almost outside the little half circle that’s formed around you and not saying a word to anyone, just looking at you. When your eyes lock with hers she holds your gaze as if it’s the most natural thing in the world for the two of you to stare intensely at each other while there’s near anarchy happening around you. Suddenly you feel yourself calming down, you take a few deep breaths and the air in the room starts to feel less crushing.

“Who are you?” you ask, because something tells you that she’s the one who can give you the information you so desperately seek. She has the answers to the questions you don’t know how to ask.

“I’m Rachel Berry,” she says softly with a small smile, walking through the circle towards you. Some faint part of you is insisting that you demand this girl tells you everything she knows but you can’t seem to do more than nod. “You’re in a glee club at school. It’s a group of students that gets together to sing and sometimes dance and we have competitions. That’s who all these people are. We’re your teammates. The older guy is our coach.” You feel relief wash over you and you’re eternally grateful to Rachel Berry for giving you the first glimpse of control you’ve gotten since you woke up. She suddenly turns away from you to address the group. “Would everyone please stop talking.” It’s more of a command than a question. Her voice though not loud carries quite well and the people gathered around you slowly stop their conversations. “I would imagine that Quinn’s current situation is quite stressful and I highly doubt that all of you bursting in here and chattering away is helping the matter. I suggest that you all introduce yourselves one at a time and then leave her to get some rest.”

“Who the hell died and made you the boss, Berry?” a skinny Spanish girl asks from across the room.

“I did,” you say quietly before you can stop yourself. These people are acting like you’ve merely fallen ill and expect you to be completely comfortable with them crowding into your room talking around and at you. But the truth is that the Quinn Fabray they know is dead and according to Dr. Steinman isn’t likely to be resurrected any time soon. Every single person in the world is a stranger. Strangers who expect you to know things you just don’t and act like someone who doesn’t exist anymore. And Rachel Berry seems to be the only one who is even trying to understand your situation. You’re more than happy to declare her the boss, queen, or president of whatever you have to in order to hold on to the tiny scrap of control she’s given you. Your small outburst seems to remind everyone of the reality of what’s happening and they all slowly nod their heads and murmur their agreement.

“Everything’s going to be fine Quinn, I promise,” Rachel whispers, leaning down slightly and just barely grabbing your hand. It’s the first time you’ve actually felt at ease since you woke up. “Just remember to breathe. And if it starts to be too much then tell them.” She smiles again, squeezes your hand, then turns and leaves. The second the door closes behind her you feel decidedly less confident but you think you can handle a few quick introductions.

 

 

***************

 

At your request everyone tells you their full names, ages, and the exact nature of their relationship to you. Finn Michael Hudson, 17, a tall and awkward boy says that you used to be his girlfriend and immediately it doesn’t sound right. Something about him doesn’t fit. Another boy, Noah Abraham Puckerman, also 17, says that he also used to date you. You consider him for a minute - tall, athletic, tan, hair only in the middle of his head and sticking straight up – and decide that he doesn’t quite fit right either. The angry Spanish girl who yelled at Rachel steps up, arm linked with a girl with yellow hair. You know there’s a word for it and it frustrates the hell out of you that you can remember how to identify that someone is Spanish yet have no clue what yellow hair is called. Santana Maria Lopez, 16, says that she and Brittany – whose last name no one can seem to pronounce except for the girl herself who claims to have forgotten it along with her middle one – nearly 18, are your ‘second in command’ and your best friends. You start to think that maybe nothing is going to fit right because you simply don’t remember these people, so you nod and move on. The rest all tell you pretty much the same story; you’ve always kind of been around each other but never really knew each other until you joined the glee club. When you asked why exactly you joined this club full of people you didn’t really know no one could give you a solid reason. Just that maybe you really liked to sing. It doesn’t seem like a terribly personal question and the fact that no one can answer it makes your stomach feel a little hollow. You start to hope that another group of kids will show up soon that fit better. You ask Santana and Brittany about who Rachel is to you hoping to get some idea of what happened earlier.

“The troll? She’s pretty much your nemesis,” Santana replies easily. Your breath catches and you feel colder. You have no idea what troll means but nemesis is a word you’re pretty clear on.

“Oh. Why?” you ask trying to make sense of it. Santana looks genuinely confused as if she expected that to be the one thing you remembered from your entire life.

“Because she’s Rachel fucking Berry. She’s annoying as hell, she’s always singing and prancing around the damn hallways and threatening to sue like everybody, she never shuts up, and she looks like her purpose in life is to find the one and only ring.” Brittany laughs at this and mutters something that sounds like ‘he’s so bald and squatty’.

“Plus her wardrobe is horrendous,” offers Kurt Evan Hummel, 16, gay, and so far kind of bitchy. A few others agree with him and you get the feeling that the hatred of Rachel Berry is almost a universal thing.

“Oh,” you say lamely, not being able to come up with anything better. “Well thank you all for coming to see me, I really do appreciate it, but I’m feeling kind of tired. I think I just need some time to really absorb everything.”

“Come on guys, let’s leave Quinn alone to get some rest.” William David Schuester, 32, glee club advisor, perhaps trying to recapture his youth through his students. Something about him makes you very uneasy. You hope he doesn’t visit you again.

The glee club slowly filters out with promises to see you later and hoping that you feel better, as if it’s just a cold you need to shake off. As you lie down and try to quiet your mind enough to go to sleep you can’t help but wonder if the people you met today will ever start to feel familiar to you or if you’ll have to start all over with them. You wonder why Rachel left so quickly. But then again you suppose if you were stuck in a room full of people that hated you then you probably wouldn’t stick around too long either. You wonder where the Fabrays are, seeing as it’s already quite dark outside. A part of you is positive that they won’t even bother coming back tonight. You wonder how with two ex-boyfriends and two best friends in the room Rachel was the only one who seemed to have any idea what you needed or how to calm you down. Mostly you wonder how you met fourteen people today that claim to be close to you and yet your nemesis, the girl you apparently hate above all else, is the only thing that fits.

 

 

***************

 

It’s still dark when you wake up and you feel even more tired than before you fell asleep. Your brain keeps running through all the things you’ve been told today trying to connect the dots but you don’t have the lines to connect any of them. You hear someone sniff to your right and turn your head to look at them slowly, fearing that maybe the Fabrays did come back after all. You can’t help but grin when you recognize her. She sniffles again and sits up straight in the chair she’s pulled up next to your bed.

“Hey you,” she says softly, taking a deep breath before returning your grin.

“Hey. You okay?” She chuckles and rolls her eyes.

“Says the amnesiac in the hospital bed. I’m fine, I just keep yawning and it’s making my eyes water.”

“Speaking of yawning, how did you get in here this late? I thought it was only family at this time of night.”

“Oh I have my ways.” She smirks and winks at you. You laugh at that, for the first time in your new existence.

“Yeah I bet you do. So why are you here anyways? Not that I’m not glad to see you or anything.”

“Well I figured your parents might not be back tonight and I thought someone should stay with you.”

“Oh. Thanks.” You push yourself up to lean against the headboard and take a few moments to just stare at her trying to see everything the glee club was saying earlier. You can’t. Not any of it. Granted it’s dark and you kind of have to squint to really see her but you look at Rachel Berry and you don’t feel anything like hatred. “Rachel. Can I ask you something?”

“No reason to stop now,” she teases and smiles. You take a deep breath and look down at your lap fiddling with the blanket.

“Santana, well the whole glee club really, they. . .” You turn to look at her suddenly deciding you need to see her face when you say it. “They all say that I hate you.” Now it’s her turn to stare at the floor.

“Ah, that,” she says quietly after a moment. She sighs and gets lost in her own thoughts for a bit before seeming to remember that you’re still waiting on a response. Waiting for her to tell you it isn’t true. “Well that’s because. . . .” She looks up then and just stares into your eyes and for a second you feel lost and grounded all at once. She snaps you both out of the trance before you can even begin to figure out what it was. “That’s because you do, Quinn.” She gives you a sad half smile before looking back down at the hands in her lap. You don’t understand. You have no idea about anything in this godforsaken world, you have no idea who you are or who anyone else is, you don’t know your favorite color or what you wanted to be when you were little, and you can’t for the life of you remember what to call the button on the wall that turns the lights on. But the one thing you’re absolutely sure of is that you don’t hate Rachel Berry, and you can’t understand why everyone around you keeps telling you that you do. On impulse you reach over and slip your hand into hers. The calm from this afternoon washes back over you.

“It doesn’t feel like I hate you, Rach.” She stares at your hands for a moment before closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, barely moving her thumb back and forth over your knuckles. You sit like that for nearly a minute before you realize neither of you knows what to say now. “It feels like maybe I hate Mr. Schuester though.” The joke catches her off guard and she starts laughing. Really laughing like you haven’t heard before and suddenly everything feels okay again.

“Yeah, you hated him the first time you met him too,” she says after her laughter dies down some. “He takes some getting used to but he’s okay. A little over enthusiastic maybe.”

“He smiles like a little kid does right before he throws something gross at you. At least I think he does. I can’t really remember.” You lock eyes for a full second before you both bust out giggling.

“You’re such a dork,” she teases before standing up and placing your joined hands back on your bed. “I’m gonna go get a coffee and maybe grab a snack. You should try to get some more sleep. It didn’t exactly look like you were doing a whole lot of resting, what with all the tossing and turning.” And just like the first time you met her she smiles, squeezes your hand, and turns toward the door.

“Hey Rach?” She stops halfway out into the hallway and turns to look at you. “What’s your middle name?” She raises an eyebrow and just stares at you for a second no doubt wondering where the hell the question came from.

“Barbara.”

“Barbara?” You immediately smash your lips together to keep from laughing. You’re not sure what you were expecting her to say exactly but that certainly wasn’t it. She just grins and shakes her head.

“Shut your mouth, Fabray,” she says before turning back to leave. “And go to sleep!” you hear before watching the door shut on her again.

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

When Rachel wakes you up it’s nearly four in the morning. She’s standing beside your bed smiling down at you. You can barely see her in the dark but you can practically feel the exhaustion pouring off of her.  
  
“Listen, I’ve gotta go home and get ready for school.”  
  
“It’s four o’clock, school doesn’t start for hours.”  
  
“Yes, but I have to get home before my dads wake up. If they knew I snuck out they’d kill me. So you can’t tell anyone I was here okay?” She’s suddenly very serious, like you’re discussing a matter of life and death.  
  
“Yeah, okay,” you agree softly.  
  
“I’m serious, Quinn, nobody. Especially not your parents because then they’d tell my parents and I’d be in a ton of trouble.”  
  
“Okay, I got it. You were never here. Rachel who?” you tell her trying to sound as convincing as you can half asleep at four in the morning.  
  
“Good.” She sighs in relief and gives you that half smile again before moving to the door.  
  
“Rachel?”  
  
“Yeah?”  
  
“Will . . .” When you saw her leaving again some part of you was desperate to make sure it wouldn’t be the last time. But now that she’s standing there staring at you, waiting on you to speak, you feel like a needy insecure little girl. “Will you come back?” She closes her eyes and lets out a shaky breath. When she looks back up at you your heart breaks a little. She looks almost miserable and when she speaks it sounds like she has to shove the words out of her throat.  
  
“Yeah, s-sure. Of course.” And the next thing you know she’s gone. You plop your head back onto the pillows and sigh, trying to figure out what the hell just happened.  
  
“Well that was kind of intense and weird,” you say to no one in particular before rolling over and going back to sleep.  


 

  
***************

  
  
Dr. Steinman wakes you up around noon and tells you that everything looks good – well as good as can be expected – and he’d like you to stay at the hospital one more night just to be sure but by this time tomorrow you should be out of here. You look around and notice the Fabrays are nowhere in sight. You’re sure that when you leave tomorrow it will be to go to a house and not a home. The doctor tells you that although you’ll be able to function just fine it would probably be wise to wait another week or two before considering going back to school.  
  
“A lot of the time people in your position want to throw themselves right back into life hoping it will jog their memories or remind them of who they are. Unfortunately this rarely works and it usually just ends up being too much too soon. People are going to expect you to be the same person you always were, even the ones who know about your condition. It’s just natural human reaction. It’s best to give yourself some time to get used to that before trying anything too stimulating.” The whole speech is said like well-rehearsed lines but you can tell he’s trying to put some feeling into it and actually connect with you. You thank him and tell him you won’t go out in the world for a while and that you’re excited to go home because you think that’s what he wants to hear.  
  
Half an hour later Christina April Cohen-Chang, 17, Arthur Jackson Abrams, 18, and Matthew Samuel Rutherford, 17, stroll into your room.  
  
“We had a free period so we thought we’d swing by,” Artie says casually rolling himself over to your right side. Tina pulls up a chair next to him and places a pile of magazines in your lap.  
  
“These are all the magazines I had at home. I figured you might want to catch back up on the stuff that really matters.” You pick up the top one and scan the cover. Apparently some woman named Oprah got into a screaming match with her girlfriend Gayle in the middle of a strip mall and now they’re fighting for custody of their dogs. The top right corner tells you that Angelina caught Brad with Jen and threatened to leave him and all twelve of their kids.  
  
“Twelve kids?” you ask no one in particular. “That sounds exceedingly painful.” Matt, who has come around to stand on your left side and was reading over your shoulder, chuckles and tells you that most of them are adopted from crazy countries no one’s ever heard of so he’s pretty sure she can probably still walk upright.  
  
“I brought you some sandwiches,” he says offering you a brown paper bag. “I was in here for my appendix last year and the food was horrible then. I didn’t know what you liked though so there’s ham, turkey, and bologna.” You haven’t eaten anything since you first woke up and now that it’s been brought to your attention you’re suddenly starving.  
  
“Thanks. I don’t really know what I like either so I guess we’ll find out together.” Matt laughs again as he pulls a chair to him and sits down. You idly wonder why you never dated him instead of Finn and Noah. There’s something kind of soothing about his voice and you’re already more comfortable around him than most of the other people you’ve met. If either of the Fabrays had tried to read a magazine over your shoulder you think you might’ve died from sheer awkwardness. Artie mentions the new song they’re doing in glee and Tina talks about how the choreography is way too ‘spin-y’.  
  
“At least we finally convinced him not to do Vanilla Ice for the invitational,” Matt offers, earning groans of agreement from the other two. You pull out all three sandwiches and take a tentative bite of each. Matt looks at you waiting to see which one will be the winner.  
  
“Definitely not this one,” you say pointing at sandwich number two.  
  
“Yeah, bologna’s not my favorite either.” He wraps the sandwich back up and puts it back in the bag.  
  
“It has that weird red plastic skin thing,” Artie says, his face a mixture of creeped out and disapproving. “I’m not okay with that.” You all three laugh at him, Tina patting him on the knee and promising to protect him from the big bad bologna.  
  
“Number one is okay, but I think sandwich three is the one.” You declare kind of proudly, picking up your sandwich and taking another bite. It’s really the first solid fact about you that you’ve found out for yourself instead of from someone else.  
  
“Oh Quinn,” Tina says resignedly, reaching up to pat your leg, “I regret to inform you that we can no longer be friends. I simply can’t associate with anyone who chooses ham over turkey.” You give her a cautious look, sure that she’s joking but then again you don’t really know her. Maybe she and turkey have a deep and lasting bond that cannot be broken.  
  
“Please,” Matt rebuts for you, “ham is _always_ the right choice. I mean just look at the animals. Turkeys are all scrawny and crazy eyed. A pig on the other hand just _looks_ delicious.”  
  
“Ham is made from pigs?!” you suddenly say, immediately dropping the sandwich into your lap. All three stare at you frozen, Artie with both hands on his wheels ready to bolt at the first sign of danger. “Kidding,” you say slowly, “amnesia humor.” They all exchange nervous glances and you’re starting to really regret saying anything until all at once they start laughing.  
  
“Well I’ll be damned,” Matt says, nudging your arm, “new Quinn is funny.”  
  
“Fo reals,” Artie chimes in.  
  
“What, the old me wasn’t funny?”  
  
“Uh . . . .”  
  
“Well . . . .”  
  
“I mean sometimes, sure,” Matt finally says, sounding like he’s humoring you.  
  
“But it was usually unintentional,” Tina admits laughing.  
  
”Ah. Well I think new me might be quite hilarious,” you pick your sandwich back up and grab a magazine, getting comfortable.  
  
“This will definitely take some getting used to,” Artie says to sounds of laughter and agreement from the other two. They start chatting again about glee, classes, the apparently terrible McKinley High football team and whatever else comes to mind. Sometimes you ask questions but mostly you just sit back eating your sandwich, flipping through magazines, watching and listening. After another half hour or so they have to leave for their next period so you thank them for the food and the magazines but mostly for the company and they all promise to try and stop by again after school. You think that maybe the only reason nothing seemed to fit before was because all the pieces got dumped out at once. After all, everyone knows you can’t start a puzzle by looking at the whole picture.  


 

  
***************

  
  
A little after three o’clock Russell Fabray comes into your room. He tells you that all the paperwork is taken care of and that Judy will be here at nine o’clock sharp tomorrow morning to pick you up before excusing himself with something about a meeting that he’s apparently already late for. Nurse Debbie comes in after he leaves to check on you and talk for a bit. Turns out she has a son about your age and thinks the two of you would absolutely hit it off. You joke that you can barely even hold a conversation with the Fabrays so you might have to wait a week or two before jumping back into the dating pool. There’s a knock on the door and suddenly Matt’s head is poking into your room.  
  
“Hey funny girl,” he says with a grin. You smile back genuinely happy to see him even though it’s only been a few hours since he left. “Brought some friends of yours.” He walks in and you’re a little disappointed to see that it’s not Tina and Artie trailing after him but Finn, Santana, and Brittany. Even more disappointed that none of them are Rachel. “How those magazines working out for you?”  
  
“Good so far. But I can’t decide whether to feel sad for this Lindsay girl or to be completely creeped out by her. She seems to have _way_ more bones than most people.” He laughs loudly and grabs a chair pulling it to the same spot as earlier.  
  
“Yeah I know what you mean, she’s like Skeletor.” At your questioning glance he elaborates, “Cartoon skeleton villain. Very bony.” You nod and turn to look at the door as you hear it shut and realize nurse Debbie has slipped out. Which causes you to remember that there are other people in the room. Santana and Brittany are in chairs against the wall in front of you both looking at their phones and Finn is across the room on your right near the door staring at a safety procedures poster with a look on his face like he’s trying to dismantle a bomb.  
  
Ten minutes later and you’re almost nostalgic of your time with the Fabrays. The two girls are still on their phones, occasionally whispering and giggling to each other. Finn has turned the TV onto some sports channel and Matt keeps looking like he’s about to say something but then changes his mind and looks back out the window behind him.  
  
“So are you like permanently Forrest Gump now or what?” Your head snaps up from the magazine you’ve been staring holes through to look at Santana.  
  
“I don’t know what that means.” You stare at her and shrug. She scoffs and looks at Brittany.  
  
“Well I guess that answers that question.” Brittany just stares and blinks a few times before laughing and returning back to her phone. You wonder what kind of person Quinn Fabray was that her best friends seem to have less interest in you than they would a distant cousin they’re being forced to baby-sit. You don’t think it can be interpreted as anything good no matter how you look at it. “We’ve got a thing, so we’re gonna go.” Santana says as she grabs Brittany and heads for the door.  
  
“Don’t mind them,” Matt says leaning towards you, “they’re kinda always like that. Comes with the uniform I think.” He winks before leaning back in his chair. Suddenly Finn’s phone starts to ring. You had forgotten he was even there.  
  
“Hey mom. No I’m just at the hospital with Quinn. Yeah okay. Just one? No problem. Yeah. Okay, bye.” He turns to face you and Matt. “That was my mom, she needs some stuff from the store for dinner tonight so I’ve gotta go. Matt, you coming?”  
  
“Actually I think I’ll stay for just a bit. If it’s okay with Quinn of course.” He looks at you and raises a questioning eyebrow.  
  
“Sounds good.” You nod feeling relieved. You were hoping to get Matt alone eventually thinking he might be able to answer some questions.  
  
“But I drove you here so . . .” Finn says looking confused.  
  
“It’s cool man, I’ll find a ride.” Finn’s confusion stays in place for a few more seconds until finally he plasters a goofy grin on his face and nods.  
  
“Cool. See ya around guys.” He waves and walks out the door. You close your eyes and practically slam your head back into the headboard and sigh.  
  
“Sorry about that,” Matt apologizes getting up to turn the TV off. “If I’d known it was gonna be that bad I never would’ve suggested they come by in the first place. Tina and Artie have a Trig test to study for and I didn’t wanna show up empty handed or anything.”  
  
“It’s fine. I seem to be kind of an awkward magnet these days.” You put the magazine you’d been pretending to read on the table by your bed with the rest and shift around to face Matt, now sitting back in his chair. “If I ask you something will you be honest with me?  
  
“Yeah sure,” he shrugs.  
  
“What’s the deal with me and Rachel Berry? I mean do I really like _hate_ her?” He takes a moment to consider the question.  
  
“As far as I can tell,” he admits.  
  
“Why though? Just because of all the stuff Santana was talking about yesterday?”  
  
“I don’t know really. I mean she can be kind of annoying,” he jokes. “But you guys have never really gotten along for as long as I can remember. Even when we were kids you two were always butting heads. Then once we hit high school it kind of . . . escalated.”  
  
“Well just because we don’t necessarily get along doesn’t mean we’re nemeses.”  
  
“Is that how you say the plural? I always wondered.”  
  
“Think so. Can’t remember,” you say with a smirk.  
  
“Funny girl,” he laughs shaking a finger towards you. “You really want the truth about Rachel?  
  
“Yes please,” you say almost pleadingly. He stares at you for a moment like he’s still unsure whether to tell you or not. Finally he gives in.  
  
“You, well you kinda torment her, Quinn.” He gives you an apologetic look for being the one that has to tell you. “At least the old non-hilarious Quinn Fabray did.” He smiles trying to lighten the mood.  
  
“Torment how?” you ask quietly looking away from him. You’re sure that you’d rather not have all the torturous details but the part of you that’s constantly and desperately seeking information has to know.  
  
“You know, just the usual high school kind of stuff. Calling her names, knocking her books out of her hands in the hallway.” He says it like it’s no big deal but you both know better. And you’re positive the list of things you do is much longer and much worse than the one he just gave you. Torment is a pretty strong word after all.  
  
“Oh.” And there it is, the proof for what you’ve suspected for a while now. Quinn Fabray was a bitch. An epic cold-hearted one if Matt’s story and the Fabrays are any indication.  
  
“But hey, you’ve always been nice to me,” he says with a small smile. You give him a look that says you clearly don’t believe a word of that. “I mean you were never flat-out mean to me.”  
  
“That’s what I thought.” You sigh and stare at the wall in front of you. “You know, I’m starting to think it’s probably a good thing that I can’t remember who I was. My best friends don’t seem to give a shit about me one way or the other, the Fabrays can barely stand to be in the same room with me, and my boyfriends are . . .”  
  
“An idiot and a guy with stupid hair?” he supplies.  
  
“Exactly,” you say with an empty chuckle. “I wasn’t a very good person I don’t think. Maybe that’s why this happened to me.”  
  
“Hey now, you can’t think like that, Quinn.” He reaches over to put his hand on top of yours and waits for you to look at him. “Shit happens ya know. To the best and the worst of us. If you don’t like who you were then be someone else. I can’t think of a better way to do it than having your memory wiped cleaned so you’re practically halfway there already.” He smiles and squeezes your hand. You give him as much of a grin as you can manage.  
  
“Yeah maybe,” you whisper.  
  
“Trust me. You don’t have to be anyone but who you want to be Quinn.” He stands up and moves around the bed toward the door. “No offense but you look kind of worn out,” he smirks. “I’m gonna head out and let you get some rest.”  
  
“Yeah, okay. Thank you Matt. For being honest with me.” He gives you a soft smile and nods.  
  
“Anytime. I’ll see you later, okay?”  
  
“Yeah. See ya.” Before the door even closes you can feel your mind trying to kick into overdrive. You lie down praying for sleep to come before your brain can start running through all of Quinn Fabray’s possible methods of torture. Or what could’ve fucked her up so badly that she even needed to torture people in the first place. However, it seems now that karma has found you it plans to stay a while. You lay awake for hours staring out the window crying for a life you can’t remember and the poor girl that somehow got caught up in it all.  


 

***************

  
  
You wake up slowly. As you open your eyes you see her sitting at your side, flipping through one of Tina’s magazines. The light from the lamp she’s using on your bedside table bright enough that you can see she looks much more casual than you’ve seen her before. She’s traded her skirt and sweater for dark jeans and a bright blue t-shirt. Her hair slightly curled and framing her face. She looks almost completely different and yet so familiar. Instantly you feel the tears threatening to come back.  
  
“Why are you here, Rachel?” She gasps and jumps back in her chair, bringing a hand up to her chest.  
  
“Jesus Quinn! You scared the hell out of me!” She laughs lightly after her panic subsides.  
  
“Why are you here, Rachel?” A part of you was desperately hoping that she wouldn’t come back. That she’d get the hell away from you while she had the chance.  
  
“Do you want me to go?” she says cautiously looking hurt but hiding it well. It’s the last thing you want but if you’ve learned anything over the last day it’s that Quinn Fabray’s instincts aren’t necessarily to be trusted. Still you can’t force yourself to send her away.  
  
“No. I just don’t understand why you’d come here,” you tell her honestly.  
  
“I told you, I thought someone should stay with you and your parents clearly aren’t going to so . . .” She closes the magazine and sits it on top of the rest on the table, looking at you curiously. “Are you okay?” You push yourself up to sit and angle towards her, taking a deep breath before starting.  
  
“I talked to Matt today.”  
  
“Yeah he mentioned in glee that they came to see you. I figured that’s where the magazines came from,” she says motioning towards the stack. “They’ve got Tina written all over them. Seriously, she wrote her name on the inside of all the covers. Like someone’s gonna steal her Star Magazine or something.” She laughs and shakes her head. You don’t understand her. Matt tells you that for years you’ve made this girl’s life a living hell and you’re inclined to believe him. Yet here she sits, at your bedside laughing without a hint of hatred or anger.  
  
“He told me some things. About me and you.” You stare at her, part of you praying for her to just give up this game and admit she hates you and walk out the door. The smile slowly drops from her face, a much more serious expression taking its place.  
  
“What kind of things?” You get the impression she’s trying to see your hand before laying down her own.  
  
“He says we’re not friends, Rachel. So does everyone else actually. So I can’t understand why you keep showing up here like we are.” She sighs and looks down, tugging at the hem of her shirt. She stays like that for nearly a minute, just staring down at nothing. Suddenly she clears her throat and sits up straight raising her head up to look at you again. Something about her is completely different. Whatever it is sets you on edge.  
  
“No Quinn, we are not friends. We never have been. But I have never been one to hold a grudge and I thought that now would be as good a time as any to try and bury the hatchet, as it were. Especially considering you cannot recall what the hatchet even looks like or where to go about digging it up.” It’s like she’s changed into an entirely different person. You suddenly remember the first time you met her and how she spoke to the rest of the glee club. That is the Rachel you’re speaking to now.  
  
“No,” you say simply. Because while it was a well delivered speech it still doesn’t explain things.  
  
“No? What do you mean no?”  
  
“I mean that, while convincing, that doesn’t really explain anything. It doesn’t explain the way I feel around you. It doesn’t explain why you talk to me like you know me.”  
  
“It’s a small town, Quinn. Even though we were not necessarily friends we did still grow up together. A certain amount of comfort is to be expected.” Something about this version of her grates against you and you’re starting to wish you had just left the whole thing alone. As it is you’re beginning to believe that arguing with this Rachel is pointless anyways. Still, since you’ve already brought it up you might as well get it all out of the way.  
  
“Really? Didn’t Santana and Finn grow up with me too? Or my fucking parents for that matter? Because they all act like acquaintances at best who couldn’t really give two shits about me. How do you know me, Rachel? ”  
  
“Well Santana and Finn have never been highly observant or, for that matter, very comfortable people to be in the presence of in general. And the Fabrays are like most other parents in this town, viewing their children as assets instead of human beings.”  
  
“I’m not asking about them I’m asking about you. Stop avoiding the question. How do you know me, Rachel?”  
  
“I’m not avoiding anything, Quinn! I am merely presenting explanations as to why you might not be comfortable around other people.”  
  
“So why am I comfortable around you? How do you know me, Rachel?!”  
  
“I don’t fucking know, okay!” The room is suddenly quiet, both of you taking a deep breath to try and calm down. She closes her eyes and slowly runs a hand through her hair. If this is the Rachel she always presented to you then it’s no wonder you never got along. “I apologize for my outburst,” she says calmly. She sounds too much like the Fabrays and it sends a chill through you. “Clearly this was not a good idea.” She pushes her chair back and stands up. You immediately start to panic.  
  
“No, Rachel you don’t have to leave. I just got carried away, I’m sorry. Everything’s just been kinda crazy you know. I have no idea what’s going on around me. All these people keep telling me all of these different things and none of it makes any sense. I don’t know what to believe or who to trust.” You try to keep your voice steady, keeping your cards close to the chest again.  
  
“I know, Quinn. And I’m afraid my involvement has only caused you more confusion.” She suddenly softens a bit, still not the Rachel from last night but a slightly closer version. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have ever come here.” Without another word she turns and heads for the door.  
  
“Rachel. Rachel, wait. I didn’t mean that –“ This time she doesn’t stop when you call after her.


	3. Chapter 3

Its six o’clock in the morning, three hours since Rachel left, and you’re bordering on furious. You’re pissed off at Rachel, at yourself, at the whole fucked up situation that is your life now. You keep running over and over every second you spent with her. Why couldn’t you have just left it alone? Why couldn’t you have just accepted that Rachel was someone sweet and funny who actually wanted to be around you unlike most people? Why did it matter so much to you who you were to each other before? But deep down you know why you couldn’t just let it go. A part of you knew that she was lying to you. Well, maybe not lying, but she was definitely hiding something. And the fact that she knew something, that she had information about who you were and was keeping it from you, it was driving you insane.  
  
Your mind keeps replaying the last minute before she left. The look on her face sad and resigned when she told you that she should never have come to see you, that it was all a mistake. Eventually your paths will cross at school and in the glee club but you don’t think it will be _your_ Rachel that you find there, just Rachel Berry. You feel panic at the thought that you may never _really_ see her again. Which is absolutely insane. You’ve spent maybe a total of an hour with the girl, you barely know her. You know more intimate details about Nurse Debbie than you do about Rachel Berry. Still, you can’t help but hear the part of you that’s saying there’s no point in starting over with this new life if Rachel isn’t in it.  
  
“Hey there, you’re up early.” Your head snaps up to see Dr. Steinman walking towards you and smiling. You didn’t even hear him come in. “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.”  
  
“No it’s fine, I was just thinking.” You give him a small smile. “Just trying to put some pieces together, ya know.”  
  
“Ah,” he says with a mixture of understanding and sympathy, picking up your chart and flipping through it. “And how’s that going?”  
  
“Not so great to be perfectly honest.” He laughs softly and writes something in the chart before closing it and coming to sit in the chair Rachel left at your side.  
  
“Well that’s to be expected unfortunately. Really all you can do now is gather the pieces and hope that eventually you can start to see how they all fit together.”  
  
“Right, patience. I don’t think I’m very good at that.” You exchange a look and a laugh before he sits back and begins to flip through your chart again.  
  
“How’s your vocabulary? Are words and definitions still hard to come by?”  
  
“Not as bad as before. Earlier I couldn’t remember the word for shoes but uh, I got it now. Clearly.”  
  
“Good, excellent. Another day or two and you should be right as rain,” he says cheerfully, standing up and tucking the chart under his arm. “I’d like to run another quick test or two and get one more scan before you leave us. Dr. Mitchell will be down to take you in a few minutes and then you’ll be free to go.” He looks at you and smiles before extending his hand to you. “I’m terribly sorry we didn’t meet under better circumstances Ms. Fabray.” You shake his hand and try for a smile without too much regret in it.  
  
“Yeah, me too. Thank you Dr. Steinman, for everything,” you say sincerely, grateful for this man who was able to save your life.  
  
“You’re quite welcome Quinn.”  
  


 

***************

  
  
When you finally get back to your room Judy Fabray is waiting for you with a bag and an impatient expression. The bag contains a pastel blue dress, white flats, a brand new cell phone (yours was apparently damaged in the wreck), and a credit card with your name on it. You change in the bathroom and the two of you walk silently to her car.  
  
It takes fifteen minutes to get from the hospital to the Fabray house where Judy hands you a key and informs you that her book club meets at ten on Wednesdays which means she’s already late. You take that as your cue to get out of the car so you do and head towards the house without so much as a backwards glance. The house is big, two stories and a four car garage, but that’s pretty much what you’d expected. You unlock the door and walk into what looks more like a museum than a place where people actually live. There are family portraits and framed certificates scattered around the walls and trophies lining the mantles. Nearly every room is beige or off-white or eggshell and most of the furniture looks brand new and entirely unused.  
  
You finally find your room upstairs at the end of a hallway. It looks slightly more lived in but still in theme with the vacant lifelessness of the rest of the house. The walls are a pale yellow and there are more trophies and a few pictures. You sit at the foot of the queen sized bed nearly in the middle of the room and slowly look around hoping for some kind of spark of recognition. Of course nothing comes. You walk across the room to a vanity to look at the pictures stuck in its mirror. There are two of you, Santana, and Brittany, all in red, white, and black uniforms and three of you with various members of the glee club. In a frame on the table is a picture of the entire glee club with Artie in the middle holding a trophy in his lap. Everyone in the picture is smiling at the camera like crazy, everyone except for you and Rachel. The two of you are on either side of Artie looking at each other and smiling in a way that you don’t think has anything to do with the trophy between you. It doesn’t escape your notice that of the few pictures in the room this is the only one Quinn Fabray felt the need to protect with a frame.  
  


 

***************

  
  
During a painfully awkward family dinner on Friday night you decide that you’ll go back to school on Monday come hell or high water. You don’t think you could survive another two weeks in this place. You spent most of Wednesday looking around the house and going through things. You looked in all the drawers and cabinets and bathroom closets. You took inventory of your books and music and clothes and flipped through some old yearbooks you found in a box on your closet shelf. Then you read the manual for your new phone trying to figure out how in the hell to work it. But when you realized that you didn’t know any numbers or email addresses or important dates to put into it you tossed it to the side. When you finally fell asleep a little before eight the house was still empty.  
  
When you woke up Thursday morning you found yourself alone again so you went downstairs and turned on the TV. After about fifteen minutes you realized that you couldn’t watch anything without wondering if it used to be your favorite show or if you hated it or if you’d already seen this particular episode a dozen times. Which you found annoying as hell so you gave up on the TV altogether and started on the music. Quinn Fabray owned about thirty CDs and you listened to almost all of them throughout the day while trying on different clothes and hairstyles looking for the ones you liked best.  
  
Friday you spent going through the books on your bookshelf randomly reading chapters from the ones that sounded interesting. A few chapters into Stephen King’s Cell you hear the front door shut and someone moving around the house. You go downstairs to find Judy with a few bags of groceries. You consider offering to help put them away before you remember that you have no idea where anything goes and leaving the kitchen without a word. The rest of the day is spent avoiding each other at all costs until Russell comes home insisting that you all have dinner together. You eat so fast you almost choke.  
  
Matt comes by to see you on Saturday and you nearly tackle him when he shows up. You drag him up to your room and thank him profusely for stopping by to keep you sane. He tells you what’s going on in glee and some of what to expect on Monday. Then he shows you how to work your new phone and copies everyone’s numbers over from his own. Before he leaves he makes you promise that you’ll come to glee Monday after school if only to sit back and watch and get a feel for it and you tell him that you will. It’s not like you’ll be in any great hurry to get back home or anything. Plus you need to talk to Rachel again and it’s the only place you know that she’ll be.  
  
On Sunday the Fabrays drag you to church because “You’re expected to be there.” The building is hot and crowded. The sermon is long-winded and the people are stuffy and overbearing. The Fabrays mill around afterwards chatting and making plans for the week. You finally get back to the house three hours after you left it. You have no idea how Quinn Fabray managed to do this every week for years on end without losing her mind. Then again, you guess she pretty much did.  
  


 

***************

  
  
Judy wakes you up Monday morning and tells you that she’s laid out an outfit for your first day and points to the chair behind her where she’s draped a pastel yellow baby doll dress and matching yellow flats. You have absolutely no idea how to even respond to that so you just nod and give her an uncomfortable smile. While you’re getting ready you figure that the outfit is her way of making sure you don’t sully the Fabray name on your first day out of the house. She drops you off and tells you that the office is inside and to the right somewhere and that you’ll need to find a ride home and somebody to take you to and from school for the rest of the week as she’ll be quite busy.  
  
You wander for a few minutes before finally finding the principal’s office. Principal Figgins introduces himself and tells you seriously that he refuses to condone any shenanigans here at McKinley High before directing you to the guidance counselor’s office next door. The guidance counselor Ms. Pillsbury is soft spoken and has a certain air of anxious worry about her. She gives you some of the ins and outs that she thinks you’ll need to survive the day and then spends a while just talking to you trying to gauge whether or not you’re really ready to be back at school so soon.  
  
She gives you a quick tour of the school pointing out all of the classes on the schedule she gave you earlier. Luckily this place doesn’t seem to be very big so you don’t think you’ll get lost nearly as much as you were worried you would. As the two of you are walking to your locker a bell rings and the hallway is flooded with students. She gives you a piece of paper with your locker combination on it and wishes you good luck. It takes three tries but you finally get it open.  
  
“Q!” you jump at a voice almost directly behind you and spin around to face a tall woman with short blonde hair in a black and green track suit. “Good to have you back. You’re off the Cheerios. I can’t very well have a head cheerleader who doesn’t even remember how to perfectly execute a double back handspring.”  
  
“Um, I’m sorry?” you say slowly, shrinking into yourself a little.  
  
“Disgraceful.” She spins and storms down the hallway knocking the drink out of one student’s hand and yanking the hat off of another before throwing it into a trash can and yelling something about looking like a street vendor’s disease riddled monkey. You remember Matt warning you about a Coach Sylvester and figure that must’ve been her. The students are starting to thin out and suddenly you notice Rachel halfway down the hall digging around in her locker. You grab your English book, slam your locker shut, and make your way towards her. You stop and lean back against the locker on her left staring at her cautiously.  
  
“So I think I just got fired from being a cheerleader,” you chuckle and hope she’ll accept the joke for the olive branch that it is. She closes her locker and walks down the hall, never once even glancing your way. You sigh and slam your head into the metal behind you. “Shit.” You don’t see her again until after school.  
  
Most of your classes go by pretty smoothly, the teachers don’t expect you to know much of anything and most of the students either ignore you or just mutter about you under their breath to their friends. In your second period English class a tall dark haired guy introduces himself as Dave Karofsky and tells you that he knows you don’t remember but the two of you used to get together every Monday during lunch to have sex in a janitor’s closet and he can’t help but notice what day it is. You roll your eyes and tell him to fuck off before asking to be excused to the bathroom. You splash some water in your face and take a few deep breaths before your phone starts vibrating in your purse. It’s a text message from Matt.  
  
 _“How you holding up?”_ You smile remembering that at least one person’s on your side.  
  
 _“As good as expected. Just got propositioned for sex during lunch.”_  
  
 _“Ha! Just another day in the life of Quinn Fabray. See you in glee?”_  
  
 _“I’ll be there.”_ You slip the phone back into your purse and take a moment to stare at yourself in the mirror. You feel awkward in your dress and headband, like you’re wearing pearls and high heels in a bar. On the way back to English you decide that tomorrow you’ll be picking out your own clothes thank you very much.  
  
Your last class of the day is Spanish 2, which you think is kind of pointless to even attend seeing as how you don’t remember Spanish 1. Then again you don’t remember much of anything from your other classes either so you might as well go to this one too. William Schuester is standing at the front of the room writing words you don’t understand on the dry erase board. Brittany and Santana are sitting in the far back corner talking to each other and laughing.  
  
“Hey head case,” Santana yells as you walk in before laughing and turning back to her conversation. Finn is sat directly in front of the girls and offers you a smile and a small wave. You wave back at him before taking a seat towards the back on the other side of the room. You spend the entire class trying to figure out the best way to apologize to Rachel and get her to talk to you again.  
  
Matt meets you out in the hallway after class and the two of you walk to glee together stopping by both of your lockers on the way. You ask him if he could take you home afterwards and maybe pick you up tomorrow morning. He tells you it’s no problem and offers to give you a ride to and from school as long as you need it. Everyone is already in the music room when you get there, scattered around and talking to each other. You catch Rachel’s eye as you walk in and she immediately turns and walks away to sit on the other side of the room. You sigh and walk over to sit beside Artie slightly outside of the group.  
  
Apparently there’s a competition in a little over a month and everyone’s arguing about which songs they should perform. Eventually they all settle down as Mr. Schuester hands out new music to everyone including you telling you that “Of course you don’t have to sing unless you want to.” He gives the two leads to Rachel and Mike who nod and move to stand in front of the group. Everyone looks confused before all turning at once to look at Finn. The boy in question however just smiles and starts looking over his sheet music. You don’t try to sing along with the group, instead opting to just sit back and listen. As soon as Rachel opens her mouth you’re transfixed. You spent all weekend listening to hundreds of songs by dozens of different people and you never heard anything like this. Something about her voice causes you to almost instantly relax for the first time in days. You feel the calm she brought you that first day all over again. You’re pretty sure you’d be perfectly content to just sit and listen to her for the rest of the day, maybe the rest of your life.  
  
As you watch her more closely you notice that while her voice is amazing something is definitely off. Her face is almost expressionless and she hasn’t taken her eyes off of her sheet music once. Mike keeps glancing over towards her trying to catch her attention but so far it hasn’t worked. After the song is finished Mr. Schuester makes a few suggestions and they run through it two more times. Rachel barely moves the entire time, almost as if she’s sleepwalking, or sleep singing as the case may be. After everyone’s dismissed you immediately walk over to where she’s gathering her stuff to leave.  
  
“You were really good up there, Rachel,” you say softly scared that any loud noises or quick movements will send her running in the opposite direction again. “Your voice is kind of amazing.”  
  
“Thank you, Quinn,” she says without even turning to face you.  
  
“Listen, I wanted to apologize for the other night. I shouldn’t have –“ She picks up her bag and spins around holding a hand up to stop you. Her eyes quickly dart around the room before she speaks.  
  
“It’s fine, Quinn. An apology is not necessary,” she says quickly before moving past you and out the door. You stare after her for a few seconds before throwing your arms up in frustration.  
  
“Fuck!” you mutter under your breath, walking back over to your seat to pick up your purse.  
  
“Hey funny girl, you ready to go?” Matt asks as he strolls towards you.  
  
“God yes,” you blurt out feeling exhausted. He laughs and slings and arm around your shoulders walking you to his car.  
  


 

***************

  
  
You’re extremely grateful to wake up to an empty house Tuesday morning. You throw on some dark jeans, a green t-shirt that says ‘Big Bob’s Discount Tires’ on the front in faded letters, and some black and white shoes from the back of your closet that say converse on the side. You look through your drawers until you find a metal watch that looks almost like a guy’s and a thick black bracelet. You look at yourself in your floor length mirror and decide to just leave your hair down. Already you feel more comfortable than you did yesterday morning.  
  
Matt greets you with a low whistle as you get in his car.  
  
“Nice threads, Fabray,” he says with a grin. “Especially the green, it makes your eyes look like they’re screaming at me or something.”  
  
“Um, thanks?” you say slowly grinning too.  
  
“No it’s a good kind of screaming. Like ‘Hey! Look how hot I am!’ or something like that.” You bust out laughing and he joins in. “Sorry. I’m just saying you should dress like that more often.”  
  
“That’s the plan I think,” you say smiling as he pulls the car out of the driveway.  
  
Apparently Quinn Fabray pretty much always wore dainty dresses and skirts. You’ve gotten nearly a dozen comments on your ‘new look’ and even more curious glances and whispers. Plus an offer from Karofsky to meet you at lunch and pretend it’s Monday. You shrug it off figuring it’s better to have them whispering about your clothes than about the fact that you can’t even remember your own birthday. Other than that the day seems to flow a bit easier than yesterday and you figure by Friday you might be able to make it through the whole day without feeling panicky and having to run to the bathroom to calm yourself down.  
  
As you and Matt approach the music room you can already hear Rachel on the other side of the door lecturing someone about the egotistical qualities of some guy named Andrew Lloyd Webber. You walk through the door and she freezes mid-sentence the second she sees you and all the air rushes out of her like she’s been punched in the stomach. She slowly scans you all the way down to your shoes before looking back up at you. She stares at you for what feels like hours and you get the feeling she’s searching for something. Finally she seems to realize what she’s doing and snaps herself out of whatever moment she’s pulled the two of you into. She shakes her head, blinking rapidly and glances around slightly panicked before she rushes out the door nearly slamming into both you and Matt in the process.  
  
“Whoa. What the _hell_ was that?” Matt asks you.  
  
“I have no idea,” you answer truthfully after a few seconds. You can’t even begin to understand what the hell just happened but there’s one person who can tell you. You turn around and take off into the hallway after her but she’s gone. You wander around for a few minutes yelling her name and checking in bathrooms but you don’t find her. No one sees Rachel Berry again for two days.


	4. Chapter 4

A few minutes into Spanish class on Friday Mr. Schuester gets an e-mail from Ms. Pillsbury that she’d like to see you. You’re halfway to her office when suddenly someone grabs your arm and yanks you into a bathroom.  
  
“Rachel? What the fuck?! Where the hell have you been? No one’s seen you since Tuesday,” you yell rubbing at your arm where she grabbed it. Turns out she’s a lot stronger than she looks.  
  
“I took a few days off,” she says offhandedly like it’s no big deal. But according to everyone in glee club Rachel has never missed a single meeting in the year and a half since she joined so you’re inclined to think that whatever happened Tuesday might in fact be a big fucking deal.  
  
“Well as humbling as it is that you’ve finally decided to speak to me, I was on my way somewhere,” you snap at her, walking back towards the door.  
  
“No you weren’t,” she says quickly.  
  
“ _Excuse me_?” You’ve had three days to stew on the fact that things keep happening between you and her that you have no way of understanding and maybe she does but she sure as hell isn’t sharing with you. So yeah, you’re a little pissed off.   
  
“What I mean,” she says slowly trying to diffuse the situation before you both start yelling, “is that I sent the e-mail. So really you don’t have anywhere to be.”  
  
“Oh. Wait what? How?” you ask, your anger forgotten for a moment.  
  
“I stepped into Ms. Pillsbury’s office to say hello and then pretended to sneeze. She immediately went home to take a shower. So after she left I used her computer.” She shrugs and a sly grin makes its way across her face.  
  
“You do have your ways, don’t you?” you say smiling back. You stand like that staring at each other for a few moments before you remember that she yanked you into a bathroom and still hasn’t explained why. “So what do you want, Rachel?” She clears her throat and smoothes her skirt down.  
  
“Right. I must insist that you stop inquiring about me, Quinn. And that you stop trying to engage me in conversation at school.” She says it like she’s asking a neighbor to please keep their dog off of her lawn.  
  
“Oh no. No, no, no,” you wave your hands in front of you and start backing toward the door. “I’m not talking to this Rachel again. No thank you, I’m leaving.”  
  
“I beg your pardon?” She almost sounds insulted.  
  
“No, don’t beg my anything you know exactly what I’m talking about.”  
  
“I’m afraid that I don’t actually, you’re being quite nonsensical.”   
  
“See, that! Right there!” You take a few steps forward pointing at her. “This Rachel that you are at school, that just showed up that night at the hospital. The Rachel that talks constantly but never about anything that actually matters, that uses fifteen words when five will do. This Rachel that, as far as I can tell, doesn’t _really_ give a shit about anybody, including me. _Especially_ me. That’s Rachel Berry and honestly, I’m kind of starting to hate her a little bit.” You take a second to calm down. You hadn’t really meant to say all that but you’d been bottling a lot of stuff up for days now and apparently the bottle just broke. You take a deep breath and try again. “So if you’d like to have a conversation with me then I want to talk to Rachel, not Rachel Berry. Just like the first night I met you, remember? I’ll be Quinn,” you say with a hand to your chest, “and you,” you step forward again and place your other hand on her chest, “you just be Rachel, okay?” She immediately takes a step back and gets a smaller version of that just been punched in the stomach look again, staring back and forth between you and your hand still hovering in mid-air.  
  
“What did you say?” she almost whispers. You sigh and throw your hands up, turning for the door.  
  
“No, wait!” she says suddenly and grabs your arm again. You stop and look at her hand and she quickly pulls it away. “I’m sorry, I mean please wait?” You sigh again before turning back around, crossing your arms and raising your eyebrows in question. “I’ll - I’ll be Rachel okay. Just Rachel, I promise.” You nod and walk over to sit on the counter.  
  
“Okay just Rachel, what do you want?” She makes her way over to your right side leaning on the counter beside you.  
  
“You have to stop trying to be my friend, Quinn.” Her eyes are pleading with you to just accept it and not ask questions. But you’re tired of not having any answers.  
  
“Why?”  
  
“Because when you get your memories back you’ll be crazy pissed at yourself for being nice to me,” she jokes and smiles at you.  
  
“The memories aren’t coming back, Rach. Quinn Fabray’s dead. It’s just me now.” Her breath hitches and she drops her head to stare at the floor.  
  
“Don’t say that. Please don’t say that.” You have to strain to hear her but you do.  
  
“Why would you want them to come back anyway? Quinn Fabray made your life hell right? Tortured you every day.” She keeps still for a few moments before responding.  
  
“Well I wouldn’t want anybody to have to live a life not knowing who they were during their formative years, Quinn.” She looks back up at you with that Rachel Berry gleam in her eyes.  
  
“Watch out, you’re getting wordy again.” You smile softly so the words don’t seem quite so harsh. She smiles back half-heartedly.  
  
“Right. It’s a fucked up situation, Quinn, and I wouldn’t wish it on anybody. Not even my worst enemy,” she says with a wink grinning up at you. You laugh and lean over bumping her shoulder with your elbow.  
  
“Dork.”  
  
“Other dork.” She bumps you back but instead of pulling away she stays there just barely leaning against you. It’s this kind of stuff that throws you. The only person you’re even remotely comfortable around is Matt and that’s because you’ve seen him nearly every day since you woke up. In the grand scheme of things you’ve barely even spent any time with Rachel. But sitting here in the quiet, side by side, arms touching, you think you could stay like this for days. But she keeps telling you that you can’t.  
  
“So, why is it that we can’t be friends exactly?” She sighs and pulls away from you staring straight ahead of her.  
  
“It’s a long story that basically boils down to your parents don’t like me very much,” she admits looking at you and shrugging her shoulders. You just stare at her waiting for the rest of it because _surely_ that can’t be it. After nearly a minute you realize she’s really not going to say anything else.  
  
“You’re kidding me right?” You slide off the counter and move around in front of her. “ _Please_ tell me you are fucking joking right now. That’s what all this has been about? The Fabrays wouldn’t notice if I came home with pink hair and a fucking face tattoo. They sure as hell don’t give a _shit_ who I talk to at school.”   
  
“Easy there potty mouth,” she says with a smirk pushing herself off the counter.  
  
“Oh please, like you’re any better.” You raise an eyebrow at her daring her to deny it. She considers it for a moment.  
  
“Valid fuckin’ point.” You both laugh and she shakes her head and sighs. “The thing about the Fabrays is that they’re really good at being practically non-existent until you do something they don’t approve of. Then they’ll make their presence known pretty damn quickly. Actually I’m kind of surprised they’re even letting you out of the house in those clothes.” You scoff at that.  
  
“Yeah, they tried not to. The second Judy saw me Tuesday night the first thing she said was that she “did not approve of my attire in the slightest” but apparently my doctor told them not to try and force too much of my old life on me or I might have a mental breakdown or something.” She chuckles at that. “So I guess they figured having a daughter in a straight jacket would do more harm to their reputation than a few pairs of jeans.”  
  
“Yeah that would explain it.” She grins for a little longer before leaning back against the counter again, her expression turning more serious. “When we first met back in fifth grade we became best friends almost instantly. For a couple of weeks at least,” she says with that sad half smile you’ve seen so many times. “Until your parents found out about it. They said you couldn’t be friends with me or they’d send you to another school and you’d lose all of your friends including me. So you just stopped talking to me and when I’d try to talk to you you would just sling insults at me. Insults that you no doubt learned from the fucking Fabrays themselves,” she mutters the last part under her breath with a little anger. “And that’s pretty much the way it’s been ever since.” Again you just stare at her.  
  
“Again I’m gonna go with ‘you’re kidding me right?’ That’s your story? We were friends for a couple of weeks _six years ago_ and that’s what all this is.”  
  
“It’s not my _story,_ Quinn, it’s the truth,” she says defensively. You throw your hands up in the air and scoff again.  
  
“Okay, let’s just say for a second that I believe that.” She opens her mouth to speak but you quickly cover it with your hand. “No, no, no. My turn.” She pulls back and swats your hand away from her but doesn’t say anything. “So even if I believe your story, why do you think that the Fabrays would still care? Or that they’d even notice for that matter?” She keeps her mouth shut and raises an eyebrow at you questioningly. You roll your eyes at her. “Your turn.”  
  
“Trust me, Quinn, they still care. And this is a small town; there are eyes and ears everywhere.” You consider the whole story for a moment. You try to make it fit but it just doesn’t. Something’s missing.  
  
“Sorry, I don’t buy it, Rachel,” you tell her with a shrug. She pushes off the counter again and stands up.  
  
“Well that works out then doesn’t it because I’m not really trying to sell anything. I’m just telling you what happened, Quinn.” She sighs and runs a hand through her hair. God, it figures that even with fucking amnesia the one thing you’d retain would be that damn stubbornness.” She raises her voice at you.  
  
“Aha! See!” you nearly yell, throwing your hands up in victory before pointing them at her. “How would you even know that if we haven’t been friends in six years, Rachel?!”  
  
“Oh my god, I could seriously slap you right now.”  
  
“ _You_ could slap _me_?! Nobody knows me Rachel, do you get that? My friends, my boyfriends, my parents, they’ve all got nothing. You’re the only one that seems to know anything about me and yet you refuse to tell me!” You sigh and walk over to the counter leaning heavily on it and stare at yourself in the mirror. “Do you know what it feels like to look in the mirror and not recognize yourself? And I don’t mean not recognizing the person you’ve become or some bullshit like that. I mean every morning you get up and look in the mirror and see a stranger on the other side.” You tilt your head this way and that. You look at your eyes, your nose, your mouth and it barely even looks familiar. It’s like staring at a moving picture. “It’s the weirdest thing,” you whisper. You glance over in the mirror and catch the sad look in her eyes. You hang your head and stare at still unfamiliar hands. “I’m lost here, Rach. And you’re the _only one_ that can help me.” You hear her sigh behind you.  
  
“I’m not the one, Quinn.” You can hear the sadness and the pleading in her voice. And how fucking dare she. You spin around, your anger suddenly back in full force, and in the blink of an eye you’re right in front of her staring her down.  
  
“Bullshit,” you say with calm intensity. “I know I was a horrible person and I’m sorry for that Rachel, I really am. I don’t know what I did to you that you’d rather sit and watch me suffer than throw me a fucking lifeline, but I’m done with your games.” She just stares up at you unmoving, barely even breathing.  
  
“There’s no game, Quinn,” she says slowly.  
  
“Bullshit! Stop lying to me, Rachel!” She jumps and takes a step back, looking off to the side and shaking her head finally getting a little angry herself.  
  
“You know what? Fine,” she says stepping back up to you. “Believe whatever you want, you always have. Quinn Fabray has always _done_ whatever she wanted and _said_ whatever she wanted because she knew she could get away with it. I brought you here to try and be nice, give you some answers and you throw it back in my face. Well fuck you. You’re done? _I’m_ fucking done, Quinn.” She moves to the door but doesn’t open it. Instead she turns to look at you over her shoulder. “Just stay the hell away from me.” And she’s gone. This time you don’t bother trying to stop her.


	5. Chapter 5

When you and Matt get to school Monday morning Ms. Pillsbury is in the hall near your locker waiting for you. She tells you that your first period Chemistry class has been moved to your last period because you’ve been switched to Spanish 1. This, she tells you excitedly, means you get to begin and end the day with Mr. Schuester. You grin and humor her. While Rachel was right and you have kind of gotten used to him you still feel uneasy when he tries to talk to you one on one. Ms. Pillsbury also tells you that the school has arranged a tutor for you so that hopefully you can catch up in enough time to still pass your classes this semester and hands you a slip of paper with your tutor’s information on it. You recognize the name immediately. You text her and the two of you agree to meet in the library during lunch to go over your classes and see what needs to be done.  
  
You walk into Spanish class and Mr. Schuester is sitting on his desk watching everyone pile in with a lazy grin on his face. You don’t know why Quinn Fabray would’ve ever voluntarily chosen to spend not one but two hours a day with this guy but you kind of hate her for it.  
  
“Hey Quinn!” he says as he notices you and starts walking your way.  
  
“Fuck me,” you mutter under your breath before slapping a fake smile on your face. “Hey Mr. Schuester.”   
  
“Quinn please,” he says putting a hand up to his chest, “it’s Mr. Schue. Schuester just sounds so formal, you know.” Seriously? The thought of having this guy bookend your days for the rest of the semester kind of makes you want to slam your head into the nearest wall. You nod and give him a tight smile trying not to look as uncomfortable as you feel. He takes a step closer to you and gets a weirdly intense look on his face. “How are you doing, Quinn?”  
  
“Um, I’m okay. I mean it’s kinda rough but I’m managing.” His expression turns sympathetic and suddenly he’s got a hand on each of your shoulders. You immediately feel the urge to push them off with a ‘Whoa, boundaries bitch’ but instead you keep your mouth shut and hope that whatever intense guidance he wants to impart doesn’t take long.  
  
“I’m always here if you need someone to talk to. Anytime Quinn, my door is always open.” He looks like he almost expects you to burst into tears right there and have a complete breakdown.  
  
“Yeah okay, thanks,” you say awkwardly.  
  
“You’re welcome,” he says way too sincerely and squeezes your shoulders before turning around and going back to his desk. The second his back is turned you can’t help but release a full body shudder trying to shake the creepy off of you.  
  
“What _is_ that?” you say harshly under your breath before turning around and stopping dead in your tracks. Sitting ten feet away and watching the whole thing with a smirk on her face is none other than Rachel fucking Berry. You throw your head back and groan. “Of course. Perfect.” You put your hands up in surrender and move across the room making a show of sitting in the absolute furthest chair from her. She rolls her eyes and goes back to writing in the notebook that’s open on her desk. You seriously consider just going up to Figgins' office and giving him big sad amnesia eyes until he lets you drop Spanish altogether.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
Finally lunchtime rolls around and you head to the library. You look around for a bit before spotting her at a table near the back flipping through a textbook and making your way over.  
  
“So you’re the one who’s gonna single handedly save my education huh?” you say announcing your presence and sitting down across from her.  
  
“I don’t know about that,” Tina says smiling, “but I’ll do my best.”  
  
“Awesome. I’m not exactly doing so damn good on my own,” you admit. “Except for English, I’m pretty sure even Finn could ace Mrs. Fakes’ class.” She laughs and nods.  
  
“Yeah, she’s like the easiest teacher to have in the whole school. She always ‘reviews the material’ and gives you like every single answer before she hands out the test.”  
  
“I know right. Plus her tests are always just like ten true or false questions.”  
  
“Exactly,” she agrees laughing again. “So what other classes are you taking?”  
  
“Spanish, American History, and Chemistry.”  
  
“Well I’m taking Chem right now so I can totally help you with that and I took American History last semester so that shouldn’t be a problem either. I’ll bring you my notes tomorrow, they’re color coordinated.” You raise an eyebrow at her.  
  
“Impressive.”  
  
“Thank you,” she says kind of proudly. “Unfortunately I can’t really help you with Spanish though. The only Spanish I know is the word for hamster.” You just look at her questioningly. “It’s El Hamster.” You both bust out laughing.  
  
“What?” you ask shaking your head. “That totally doesn’t even fuckin’ count, Tina,” you tell her causing you both to start laughing again.  
  
“Foreign languages are not my strong suit okay.”  
  
“Clearly,” you say with another chuckle.  
  
“But everything else I’ve got you covered in so if you can find someone to help you out with Spanish then you should be good by the time exams come around.” Rachel quickly flashes into your mind but you immediately reject the idea. You’re done asking her for help.  
  
“No worries, I’ll find somebody.” She just stares curiously at you.  
  
“What?” you say feeling a little self-conscious   
  
“Huh? Oh, nothing. It’s just, you kinda talk like a completely different person now,” she says with a small laugh. “It takes some getting used to sometimes.”  
  
“Really? How did I talk before?”  
  
“Well it’s not like we chatted all the time exactly but the few times we did talk you were always very formal and straight to the point,” she says with a stern look on her face before smirking.  
  
“Oh. Huh.”  
  
“Plus you kinda curse like a sailor now. That’s new.” You chuckle at that.  
  
“Yeah I had kind of noticed that,” you admit. “I’ve been wondering where I get it from actually since I’m pretty sure it’s not exactly something I picked up from the Fabrays.”  
  
“True,” she agrees. “Maybe you picked it up from Puck.”  
  
“Yeah maybe.” She stares at you again and you can see the question in her eyes so you wait patiently for her to ask it.  
  
“What’s it like?” she finally says quietly. “Not remembering.” You take a deep breath and try to figure out the best way to describe it.  
  
“Frustrating mostly. Some days are worse than others. I’ve gotten pretty good at keeping myself distracted from it though. Music seems to help a lot. Still, sometimes it gets kind of overwhelming. Like with the school thing, all last week I kept going through my textbooks trying to study _knowing_ that a few weeks ago I just knew all this stuff and now I can’t seem to retain any of it. And I’m sure Quinn Fabray had some sort of tricks or whatever to help her remember it all but I don’t really have a clue. So now I’m a junior in high school having to relearn how to study. Having to relearn most everything actually. And the weirdest things will trigger it. Like I hit my arm on a door yesterday and suddenly I’m wondering if I’ve ever broken any bones or ever been sick enough to be in the hospital. I see some kids and I’m wondering what I wanted to name mine or if I even wanted to have any for that matter. It’s just there under the surface all the time, the not knowing.” That was _way_ more than you meant to say but she’s the first person to really ask you about it. Despite the fact that you can tell most people want to. The mood has suddenly turned sort of depressing and you get enough of that at home. “Also I have absolutely no idea where the girl kept her pens.” The joke breaks up the tension threatening to settle over you both and Tina laughs. “I have searched my entire room. Paper everywhere but not a single writing utensil in the whole damn place.”  
  
The two of you talk a little while longer discussing which areas you’re really struggling with and deciding that you’ll meet after school Tuesday and Thursday at your house, since it’s guaranteed to be empty and quiet, before the bell rings signaling the end of lunch. You thank her again and you both go back to class. You spend the rest of the day thinking about the things you don’t know and how it’s starting to look like you may never get the answers to the ever-growing list of questions in your head.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
You walk into Spanish Wednesday morning to find Rachel already at her desk, Spanish book open and scribbling away in her notebook. You take a deep breath and walk over to her.  
  
“So can we call off the war for just a second?” She slowly looks up and considers you for a moment before responding.  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“Good, thank you. I need to ask you something,” she opens her mouth to interrupt you so you say the rest quickly before she can, “and I promise not to get mad if you know the answer and I won’t ask any follow-up questions. I’ll just thank you and leave you alone.” She looks hesitant like she doesn’t believe you at all.  
  
“Ask,” she finally agrees. You take another deep breath almost positive that she’ll either get pissed or simply turn you away claiming ignorance.  
  
“I need to use my computer but it’s got a password on it. I was hoping that maybe you might somehow know it.” She looks hesitant again and you can tell she’s seriously considering just blowing you off. “And again, I’m not interested in how or why you would know this. I just need to be able to type up my homework.” She just keeps staring at you, barely even blinking. After a few moments you give up, you’ll just have to stay after school and use the library computers. “You know what, never mind it’s fine.” You turn and take a step towards your seat.  
  
“Try New York,” you hear softly from behind you. When you turn to look at her she’s already looking back down and flipping through her textbook again.  
  
“Thank you, Rachel,” you say sincerely and go to your desk. Things are better between the two of you after that. You still don’t talk but you’re at least civil to each other when you’re in the same room. The fact that you and Rachel aren’t exactly fighting anymore should be a tally in the ‘things that are good’ column you think. But the problem with that is that all the time you were spending being furious and annoyed at her before is now consumed with just plain wondering about her again. Where before you were avoiding even looking her way now you catch yourself watching her nearly all the time. You still can’t decide which is more agonizing.   
  
  


***************

  
  
  
“You really don’t have to stay. I can just call you when I’m done.”  
  
“Quinn, would you stop already? I told you it’s fine. Plus you said it shouldn’t take that long anyway right?”  
  
“Well no, but-“  
  
“ _So_ I’ll be fine. I need to study for Government anyway.”  
  
You and Matt are at the hospital standing near the nurses’ station. When he released you Dr. Steinman said he’d like to see you back in exactly two weeks for an ‘amnesia check-up’ of sorts; another brain scan and probably an eye and vocabulary test, which you don’t think will take long since you haven’t gotten a single word mixed-up in over a week. Still, you feel bad enough that Matt has to spend his Wednesday evening chauffeuring you all over town, much less sitting in the hospital alone waiting around on you. You try to talk him out of it again but he’ll have none of it so eventually you just start chatting about other things to pass the time. After a few minutes you see Dr. Steinman coming down the hall towards you.  
  
“Ms. Fabray,” he greets you shaking your hand and then turning towards Matt. “And your friend . . .” he extends his hand towards Matt with a questioning look.  
  
“Matt Rutherford, Sir.”  
  
“Ah. A pleasure to meet you Matt. Shall we?” he looks back at you and gestures down the hallway. You nod and take a step towards him.  
  
“I’ll just be over there when you’re done,” Matt says pointing towards some chairs in the corner of the waiting area before making his way to them.  
  
“So how are you feeling?” Dr. Steinman asks as the two of you start to walk down the hall.  
  
“Decent, considering. I’m back at school.”  
  
“Good. And how’s that going?”  
  
“You know, good days and bad,” you tell him with a small smile. The guy may be a doctor but he’s not a shrink. You don’t think going into detail about how some days you want to claw your own hair out will do either of you any good.  
  
“Well that’s to be expected. And I’d imagine the young man helps quite a bit,” he says with a knowing smirk.  
  
“He does actually,” you say with a hint of a smile before you realize what the doctor’s inferring. “Oh wait, no no no no. We’re not like,” you wave your hands in front of you trying to get the message across, “we’re not together or anything. He’s just a friend. A good friend, but just a friend.”  
  
“Of course, of course,” he says leading you into the testing room  
  
After almost an hour you’re sitting in Dr. Steinman’s office going over your results. He says the scan is about the same as when you left which he was unfortunately expecting but still you think a little part of both of you were hoping to get some surprising good news today. He tells you that everything looks good and to call him if you have any questions or concerns. You thank him, shake his hand again, and finally make your way back towards the front lobby.  
  
“Hey, sorry. I’m done finally.”  
  
“Already? Feels like you just left,” Matt smiles and grabs his stuff before throwing an arm around your shoulders and leading you out the door.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
Friday is your first _good_ day. Rachel actually smiled at you in Spanish and you managed to avoid eye contact with Schuester the entire class, Karofsky was nowhere to be found in English, and during American History you finally figured out which of all the chips in the vending machine by the front office was your favorite. Matt meets you in the hallway outside your Chem class for glee like always and you smile and offer him your bag of barbeque chips. He smiles back and takes a handful.  
  
“These,” you say holding the bag up proudly, “are my absolute favorite chips.”  
  
“Is that a fact?” he asks laughing lightly.  
  
“Yes Matty, that is indeed a fact. May I call you Matty?”  
  
“Oh absolutely not,” he says easily and shakes his head at you.   
  
“Fair enough.” He laughs again as the two of you stop at your locker.  
  
“What’s got you in such a good mood, funny girl?”  
  
“Just having a good day is all.” You take a paper out of your Chem book before tossing it in your locker and closing it.  
  
“And what’s that?” he points to the paper in your hand as you both turn and start walking toward the music room.  
  
“Just something I wanna show Tina.” You throw your empty chip bag away in the trashcan by the door and make a beeline for Tina as soon as you see her across the room.  
  
“Hey Quinn!” She smiles and waves.  
  
“Boom! B+, bitch!” you say excitedly holding up the pop quiz you were given in Chemistry earlier.  
  
“What?!” She grabs the paper from you with one hand and high fives you with the other.  
  
“I mean it was just like ten questions and they were all pretty easy but still, look who can actually remember stuff.” You haven’t really been able to stop smiling since you got the paper back.  
  
“Oh my god, I am so _awesome_!” she says still looking over the quiz in her hands.  
  
“Hey!”  
  
“I mean we,” she corrects, “we are _so_ awesome!”  
  
“Damn straight.” She hands the paper back and then just looks at you placing a hand over her chest.  
  
“I feel like I just saw my child take their first steps,” she says almost seriously and you laugh.  
  
“Well it’s a wonder I didn’t fall straight on my ass Ms. El Hamster,” you tease with a smirk.  
  
“It’s a legitimate Spanish term!”   
  
Mr. Schuester comes in and everyone settles down and takes a seat. You’ve been practicing the same two songs all week and today for the first time you actually join in the background vocals instead of just sitting back and listening. Artie, who is sitting beside you like he almost always is, notices and turns to give you a huge smile before turning back around and putting an arm around Tina. After you’ve run through both songs Rachel raises her hand and tells Mr. Schuester that she has something to say to the group. She walks up to the piano and turns around to face everyone. She starts into a lecture about how most all of the talent in the room is ‘sub par at best mostly due to lack of practice and dedication’ but you quickly tune her out and just watch her for a bit. She seems to be trying _very_ hard to look almost furious but she’s so tiny she just can’t quite pull it off. You’d call her cutely annoyed at best. After over a minute has passed and she’s still talking you look around and notice not a single person is listening to her, not even Schuester.  
  
“Rachel,” you interrupt her gently, “you’re babbling.” You can’t help but smile lightly as you say it. At some point in the last minute she’s gone from cutely annoyed to adorably flustered. The second the words are out of your mouth though she turns her head toward you with a slightly shocked look on her face.  
  
“Right. Babbling,” she finally says after a moment. “Anyways I believe I’ve made my point clear,” she almost mumbles before walking back to her seat without another word.  
  
“Damn. Maybe there is some Quinn Fabray left in her after all.” You hear Santana say somewhere behind you. But you know that look. That wasn’t Rachel’s ‘I can’t believe I’ve just been interrupted and kind of insulted’ look. It was her ‘something just happened that only I know about’ look. Though you have to admit she’s getting quite good at hiding it these days. Still, you can hardly even bring yourself to care. It’s a good day after all. You’ll wonder what the hell that was all about tomorrow.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
Tuesday is the worst day you’ve had since you woke up. Music has stopped working and all weekend long you sat at home with question after question clawing at your brain. Were the Fabrays always like this or had your house once held an actual family? Have you ever been out of Ohio? Are you still a virgin (which you doubt if Noah is any indication) and if not then how did you lose it and who to? Was Sarah ever the kind of sister you could go to if you were really in trouble or has she always been merely an offshoot of the Fabrays themselves? You tried to drown the questions out like always with whatever music you could find but it simply wasn’t working anymore. You asked Judy if there were any videos in the house, birthdays or baby videos or _anything_ really that might be able to tell you something. She gives you an odd look and a “We’re not family video people” before walking out the door for some meeting or club.  
  
Monday at school everything was too loud and too fast and just too _much_. You had to excuse yourself to the bathroom twice every class and you skipped glee telling Matt you were going to walk home and try to clear your head. You walked around town for hours with countless questions swimming around in your head constantly on the verge of screaming at the top of your lungs.  
  
What made Tuesday even worse though was English. Mrs. Fakes assigned a one-page paper that was due the following day. The subject was ‘The best day of my life’ which really you thought was just cruel to even assign with an amnesiac in the class. Immediately your head was bombarded with questions and you felt almost sick. You excused yourself to the bathroom and didn’t go back to class until halfway through Chemistry.  
  
When the bell signaling the end of school rings you don’t even hear it, too lost in your own thoughts. It’s not until the door slams shut behind everyone that you snap out of it. Matt is waiting in the hallway but you barely even acknowledge him as you turn and make your way towards the music room.  
  
“Whoa,” you hear as you blow past him. “What’s up with you?” he asks as he catches up to you.  
  
“Bad day,” you answer simply without even looking his way.  
  
“Oh. You wanna talk about it?”  
  
“Not really.” You walk into the music room and go straight up to Santana as soon as you spot her. “I need to talk to you.” She gives you a bored look and goes back to her phone. “Look I know we weren’t exactly great friends but you have to know _something_ about me.” You look around and catch Finn and Noah’s eye. “My favorite band, my dream car, my first crush, anything,” you say addressing all of them now. Santana finally puts her phone down but still has that completely uninterested look on her face. Finn and Noah however are just staring at you with blank expressions.  
  
“You always listened to whatever music I played in the car,” Finn offers after a few moments.  
  
“And we didn’t exactly do a whole lot of talking,” Noah says with a smirk. Santana just looks at you and shrugs.  
  
“You’ve got to be kidding me.” You sigh and run your hands through your hair. You can feel tears threatening to fall but you know if you start you won’t be able to stop so you do your damnedest to hold them back.  
  
“I am so sick of this shit,” Santana suddenly says and you snap your head up to look at her. “You’ve been moping around for weeks now playing the victim all ‘poor me, I can’t remember anything and all my friends are assholes and nobody really knows me’ and I am _so_ fucking sick of it.” You open your mouth to fight back but she doesn’t give you the chance. “No, shut up, I’m talking now.” She stands up and walks through the chairs towards you. “It’s true Quinn, none of us knows a fucking thing about you but I’m getting _really_ tired of you blaming that on us.”

She calms down a little and gets a slightly softer look on her face. “We used to be friends you know, real friends. We hung out all the time and had sleepovers and all that girly kid shit. But then the summer before high school you just fucking disappeared. Every time I tried to text or call you never answered, I’d go to your house but you were always off somewhere doing god knows what. I thought maybe you were just going through some stuff so I brushed it off.” She sighs and takes a few steps away from you before turning back around. “Then when school started I thought everything would finally go back to the way it was. But it was like you were a completely different person. I mean we were always kind of bitches, the three of us,” she gestures to Brittany who just shrugs and nods, “but you were different. You were cold and angry. And I _tried_ okay, for _months_ I tried,” she’s suddenly more sincere than you’ve ever seen her and you notice that at some point you’ve starting crying. “But you wouldn’t say more than two words to me unless you were barking orders or trying to show me up at fucking cheerios practice!” she almost yells.

She takes a deep breath and suddenly for the first time since you’ve met her, Santana Lopez looks exhausted and almost near tears. She takes a few moments to calm herself down before she speaks again. “So yeah Quinn, nobody here knows anything about you,” she says quietly and half-heartedly gestures around the room. “But that’s your own damn fault.” She looks at you for a moment before just shaking her head and turning around. She walks over to Brittany, grabs her stuff and the two of them head for the door. Brittany stops as she walks by you.  
  
“I’m sorry you’re lonely Quinn,” she says honestly putting a hand on your shoulder. You can barely even see her through the tears. She squeezes your shoulder and gives you a sad smile before following Santana out the door. You feel nauseous. Santana was your last chance. I mean sure it was obvious that the two of you weren’t exactly close but from what you’ve heard from everyone else and the pictures in your room you had at least spent time together. Even if she didn’t know anything important she could at least give you _something_. But she’d just made it quite clear that she doesn’t even have _that_ to give you. Because Quinn Fabray never gave it to her. You look around the room and everyone’s looking at you with either sympathy or just plain pity. Matt takes a few steps towards you but you hold a hand up to stop him.  
  
“Don’t. I just,” you feel like you can’t get any air into your lungs and you can barely speak. “I need to . . . . I can’t.” You’re starting to hyperventilate and you don’t think you can stand to be in this room for another second. You spin around and start running. By the time you finally stop you’ve ended up in the second floor bathroom that you’ve learned is pretty much always deserted. You walk over to the sink and lean heavily on it and finally let your tears have free reign.  
  
After a few minutes you hear the door open and close. You don’t even need to look up to know who it is, you can practically feel her.  
  
“What, Rachel? What do you want from me?” you manage to quietly choke out through the tears. You hear her fidget with her keys for a few seconds before she sighs and lays them on the counter, taking a few steps toward you.  
  
“It wasn’t supposed to last this long you know. You were supposed to have remembered by now. That’s how it always works in the movies anyways. There’s a week or two filled with hi-jinks and misadventures and then suddenly you’re checking out at a grocery store or getting the mail and,” she snaps her fingers, “you’re back.” You take a steadying breath and try to stop the tears enough to talk before you look over at her.  
  
“Why are you talking to me now? Shouldn’t you clear out of here before someone catches us within twenty feet of each other?” You try for angry but it just comes out sounding tired. She hardly seems to notice though, just looks at you with that same half smile that’s starting to drive you insane.  
  
“You don’t have a favorite band. You’re kind of a music whore actually, you’ll listen to most anything as long as it’s decent. Except for Moby, you hate him. But who doesn’t really.” You look back down at the sink as your tears overwhelm you again. You can’t take this right now. Not from her. Not when you know it won’t last. “You tell everyone your dream car is a BMW because that’s what they expect to hear,” she continues like you’re not hunched over a sink practically sobbing five feet from her, “but really it’s a 1967 black Chevy Impala. I have no idea why, the things are _huge_ , but ever since you started watching that show you’ve been very insistent about it. Apparently they’re ‘just so pretty.’” She laughs lightly and takes another small step closer. Your tears are starting to subside again and numbness is beginning to slowly wash over you. You just have to get away from her before she stops feeling sorry for you and realizes what she’s saying and starts freaking out like she always does. You really can’t handle that right now. “And your first crush . . .” You hear her take a deep shaky breath before she tries again. “Your first crush was me,” she almost whispers. You slowly stand up straight and turn to face her but she’s not looking at you anymore. She’s staring somewhere off to the side, eyes unfocused like she’s watching a memory. “We were ten. You used to wear flowers in your hair every day. You always smelled like apples and rain.” A ghost of a smile makes its way across her face and you’re starting to think that maybe this time, for once, she won’t pull away from you and disappear.  
  
“Rachel?” you ask quietly trying to bring her back to you. It’s snaps her out of whatever memory she was caught in and she shakes her head and takes a moment to compose herself before answering you.  
  
“Right. Sorry, I was just . . .” she smiles a little and shakes her head again. “We should talk.”


	6. Chapter 6

“We should talk.”  
  
And there it was, what part of you had known all along. There was something between you and Rachel, something more than friends, something that mattered. Still, Rachel doesn’t exactly have the best track record of being honest and open with you and you’re terrified this will end like it always has before. You take a shaky breath and wipe the tears from your face, which is pretty pointless since you’re still crying a little but you need a second to think.  
  
“And by talk do you mean banter for a minute until you start dodging questions and I start getting angry and then you leave? Because I really can’t take that again, Rach. Not today.” The tears cause you to stumble over some of your words and your voice breaks twice. You see something almost like shame flash across her face for a second before she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. When she glances back up at you she looks completely exhausted.  
  
“No.” She steps toward you until you’re almost touching. “No more dodging questions. And no more getting angry.” She reaches up and brushes your hair behind your ears before slowly wiping your tears away with her thumbs. “I promise,” she says quietly. You close your eyes and for the first time in days your brain is finally quiet. She keeps gently running her thumb over your left cheek and you wonder how you survived this long without this. You open your eyes and take a moment to just look at her. She looks like the Rachel from the night you first met, like _your_ Rachel.  
  
“Okay. Let’s talk.” She smiles and moves away from you to pick up her keys from the counter.  
  
“But not here.” She leads you through the school careful to avoid any places where someone might see you. By the time you get to her car your tears have stopped and new questions have started forming in your head, although they’re more idle wonderings than insistent demands like before. You walk around to the passenger side door but she stops you. “No, in the back. And lay down.”  
  
“You’re kidding right?” She gives you a look that says she clearly isn’t so you raise your hands in surrender and lie down in the backseat. “Where are you taking me anyway?” you ask as she starts the car and pulls out of the lot.  
  
“Somewhere we can talk.”  
  
“I figured that. Where exactly?”  
  
“Just somewhere,” she answers cryptically.  
  
“If I wake up in some dirty alley with no pants I’m gonna be really upset. I’m just saying.”  
  
“What? Why would I take your pants, Quinn?” she asks glancing over her shoulder at you.  
  
“I don’t know! For all I know you stalk around town every night under cover of darkness de-pantsing people left and right.” She snorts and checks her mirrors.  
  
“Yeah okay, I’ve got a trunk in my room at home full of the stolen pants of homeless guys and small children.”  
  
“Whoa, I never said anything about kiddie pants. Weirdo.” She laughs like you haven’t heard in days.  
  
“Why are we even talking about my hypothetical thievery of leg wear?” she asks more to herself than you. You both laugh at that as your phone goes off in your pocket.  
  
“I don’t know,” you admit still chuckling as you pull your phone out to see who it is.  
  
“Who’s that?” She glances back toward you again.  
  
“Matt. He wants to know if I’m okay.”  
  
“Don’t mention me. Tell him you’re fine but you decided to walk home or something.” You raise an eyebrow at her and then roll your eyes at yourself when you realize she can’t see you. The car is silent for a minute until your phone goes off again.  
  
“He wants to know if you’re with me since you took off right after I did, presumably to go after me.”  
  
“Tell him I found you and tried to console you but we ended up fighting and some insults were thrown and I started crying and stormed out,” she says easily without missing a beat.  
  
“Wait, why does there have to be insults and crying?”  
  
“Because if we fought and I had merely gotten angry I would’ve returned to glee and channeled my anger into singing. It’s more believable that I would leave school if you made me cry.” You just stare at her for a moment before typing your reply to Matt.  
  
“Why are you so good at this? The whole covering your tracks thing.” She laughs lightly to herself.  
  
“I had a good teacher.” She checks her mirrors again before turning off the road and suddenly you can see trees out the windows. But not ‘far off in the distance’ trees, like ‘ten feet from the fucking car’ trees. “You can sit up now if you want.” You do and look around to find that you are slowly making your way through a forest. In a car.   
  
“Um, Rachel, why are we in the woods?” you ask slowly.  
  
“You’ll see. We have to walk from here.” She stops the car and turns it off before getting out and going to the trunk. She comes around with a blanket in her hands and opens the back passenger door. “Follow me,” she says simply and turns around to start making her way deeper into the trees. “Thank god I changed into jeans for glee club earlier,” you hear her mumble to herself.  
  
“She’s gonna kill me. Yup. She’s gonna chop me up into tiny pieces and feed me to woodland creatures.” You shrug and get out of the car to follow her since it’s really your only option. The two of you walk in silence for a few minutes and just as you’re about to ask her again where the hell she’s taking you the woods open up into a small clearing. Rachel walks to the middle of it and lays the blanket out before sitting on top of it. The tension she’s been carrying ever since you left the bathroom finally leaves her as she leans back on her elbows, face to the sun and smiling. You can’t help but grin at the sight of her relaxed and happy for the first time in weeks. You decide to let her have her moment and wander around investigating the place. You like it here, it’s quiet and peaceful and there are more shades of green than you were even sure existed. “So what is this place?”  
  
“Just somewhere we used to come to get away from everyone. Although we haven’t been here in over a year, Twilight kind of ruined it for you.” You hear her laugh softly and turn around to give her your ‘yeah, I’ve got amnesia so I have no idea what the hell that means’ face that you’ve perfected over the last few weeks but she’s still got her head toward the sky with her eyes closed. “The last time we were here you lasted less than a minute before you ripped your shirt off and yelled ‘Look away Rachel! Lest you be blinded by my horrible sparkly curse!’” She laughs a little louder and turns her head to look at you smiling. You smile back and take your seat on the blanket to her right.  
  
“You know I have no fuckin’ clue what you’re talking about right?” She chuckles again and closes her eyes turning her face back to the sun.  
  
“Yeah I know. I kind of envy you that part of it. God, I wish I could forget those damn movies. And X-Men: The Last Stand. And Smallville.” She shakes her head no doubt internally chastising whatever it is she’s talking about. You just grin and stare at her. She’s almost the Rachel from that first night you met but there’s something different, something just _more_ and _right_ about her. You think if she had just shown you this Rachel that night she would’ve saved you a lot of grief because you would’ve known exactly who she was to you, just like you do now. She’s the only thing that really matters. Suddenly all the questions in your head about you and who you were are replaced with a dire need to know who _she_ is. Which causes you to remember that there’s a reason the two of you are sitting on a blanket in the woods out in the middle of nowhere.  
  
“So,” you start slowly, hoping that the tension that always seems to inevitably appear around the two of you will take a break this time, “you wanted to talk?” She sighs but the grin doesn’t leave her face.  
  
“Yes.” She doesn’t move or say anything else so you bring your legs up in front of you and rest your head on your knees waiting patiently. After all, you’ve been waiting for this story practically your entire life, the new one anyway. You can give her a few more minutes. “You know,” she finally starts, opening her eyes with her head still pointed to the sky, “I really did think that not telling you would be easier for you. For both of us really. I mean, you couldn’t remember _anything_. So why would this even matter right? It would just be more stress, which you certainly didn’t need. But I didn’t decide soon enough. I couldn’t help myself so I came to see you and somehow you just knew. I should’ve just stayed away but,” she closes her eyes again for just a second while a pained expression flashes over her face, “ _God_ , I couldn’t.”  
  
“It’s okay, Rach.” You reach over and lay your hand on top of hers. “I’m glad you came to see me. I don’t think I could’ve gotten through those first few days without you.” She turns to look at you with those same sad eyes you’ve seen too many times and your heart breaks a little. She tries for a smile but it’s tinged with sadness. She takes a moment to compose herself before sitting up and turning to face you crossing her legs in front of her. She squeezes your hand then slips hers out from underneath it placing it in her lap with the other.   
  
“Everything I told you before, about us being friends and your parents not allowing it, was true. I just didn’t tell you the rest. One day we were friends and the next we weren’t. I was young and hurt and didn’t understand it. So when you lashed out I lashed right back. After that we pretty much just avoided each other and when we couldn’t we almost always ended up fighting.” She reaches over to the edge of the blanket and picks a blade of grass and starts fiddling with it. You sit quietly and wait content to let her tell your story in her own time. “Then the summer before high school we signed up for the same dance class in town. We fought a little at first but it was a lot harder to maintain away from school and everyone else. After a week or two we were talking and laughing like nothing had ever happened. Then one day you came into class and ignored me all day, wouldn’t even look at me. When I cornered you after and demanded to know what your problem was you just started crying.” The blade of grass she picked is now in thin strips on the blanket in front of her so she reaches for another one. You have a feeling she’s using it to distract herself from reliving the story as she tells it. “You wouldn’t tell me what was wrong though, just asked me to come to dance class half an hour earlier next time. So I did and we found an empty room and you told me everything. You were terrified that your parents would send you off to boarding school if they even suspected you were being _tolerant_ of me so we agreed to keep fighting and keep up appearances in public and try to be friends whenever we could slip away.” She picks up the shredded grass and throws it off the blanket before lying down on her side and propping herself up on her right elbow.  
  
“And that’s it? We’re just secret best friends?” you ask skeptically when she doesn’t continue after a few moments. She laughs quietly and smiles.  
  
“No, not quite. I’m just realizing how long this whole story actually is. I’ve never had to tell it to anyone before.”  
  
“Yeah, it is a bit lengthy. Remind me next time to just ask for the cliff notes version.”  
  
“Careful, or I’ll give you the Rachel Berry version and we’ll be here till midnight,” she jokes. You both laugh and take a moment to shake off the serious mood that seems to have taken over. She rolls over onto her back with her hands behind her head and stares up at the sky again, no doubt trying to figure out where to pick your story back up. You take the opportunity to just look at her, jeans and tennis shoes and a plain bright red t-shirt, lying in the grass looking more at ease than you’ve ever seen her. You suddenly have the urge to curl up beside her and rest your head on her shoulder. It’s feels more like something habitual than an urge actually, just the logical thing to do, and you wonder how you could have missed it all this time. How you ever could’ve mistaken this thing between the two of you for anything else. “What?” she suddenly asks startling you out of your thoughts.  
  
“What what?”  
  
“You’re trying to figure something out.” You consider it for a moment.  
  
“Yes. But I think I’ll hold my questions until the end.” She glances over and rolls her eyes at you, grinning.  
  
“So,” she starts again with a deep breath, “we were friends. We’d find a way to sneak off once or twice a week, usually at night, and even managed to talk on the phone a few times. It was like we couldn’t _really_ be ourselves around anyone else, not like we could with each other, too many expectations. It was almost like we were addicted to each other and pretty soon we started measuring time in how long it’d been since we’d talked or how long until the next time we met up. A little over a month after we started it though everything changed. It was a Thursday, nearly midnight, and we were in this clearing. I was babbling on about something and out of nowhere you just leaned over and kissed me.” That half smile appears on her face and you can see her watching the memory in her head. “The second it happened it felt like something I had forgotten to do that I’d just remembered. Like it was what I was always supposed to have been doing and I’d just gotten distracted from it for a while. You however had . . . . different feelings about it.” You stretch out on your side to face her and prepare for another example of the pain you’ve caused Rachel Berry. “You were already scared of getting caught just being friends with me. If your parents ever found out that there was more to it they’d ship you off to fucking Siberia and none of us would ever hear from you again. You started to panic and said you needed time to think. I was, of course, immediately devastated. I just _knew_ that you were freaking out and completely regretting it and that I’d never see you again. But you knew me, even back then, so you kissed me again and you said ‘I just need some time to figure out how to keep you.’” You see a tear roll down the side of her face and into her hair and it almost immediately triggers your own. You hold them back though; it doesn’t feel like it’s your place to cry for something you can’t even remember. She sniffs and clears her throat. “Then about three weeks later we finally met up and you presented “The Plan,”” she brings her hands out in front of her and does little air quotes with her fingers.  
  
“The plan?” you ask when she fails to elaborate. “And what exactly was that?”  
  
“The Plan is our life now. Well our life a month ago anyway.” She rolls back over to face you mimicking your position and you’re almost touching. “You said we’d have to step up our fighting because with you in high school now they’d be watching you like a hawk to make sure you didn’t do anything stupid to disgrace the family name. We’d have to escalate and make sure that everyone who knew us would swear on their deathbed that we absolutely hated each other. We became different people. I mean, I was always a bit of a diva and you were always kind of a bitch,” she smirks at you and you smile back grateful for some much needed levity, “so we took that and just kind of amplified it. It made things easier to bear. That way it wasn’t you pushing me in the halls or throwing a slushie in my face, and it wasn’t me always ratting you out and getting you into trouble with the teachers and Coach Sylvester. That was Quinn Fabray and Rachel Berry. They were like roles we played every day. And when we were together, we were just Quinn and Rachel.” She doesn’t say anything else and after a few seconds you get the impression that she’s not going to.   
  
You have too many questions and thoughts floating around your head and you can’t seem to concentrate on any particular one long enough to voice it. Part of you isn’t even sure you want to say _anything_ , thinking you should just let this sink in for a few minutes. You look down at the blanket between you and notice that at some point the hands not holding you both up had reached for each other and your fingers have laced together. You don’t even remember it happening.  
  
“Hey.” She tugs on your hand gently bringing your attention back to her. “Are you okay?” You feel her thumb start to slowly rub over your own and you’re pretty sure she’s not even aware that she’s doing it. That’s when it really hits you. For over two years you’ve been with this girl, she knows you better than anyone in your entire life, has thousands of memories of moments between the two of you, part of who she is is forever and completely wrapped up in you. And you don’t remember a single second of it.  
  
“I’m sorry, Rachel.”  
  
“Sorry? For what?”  
  
“For forgetting. For leaving you here alone.” You feel like you’ve failed her in the worst way possible. After all you started this whole thing, you kissed her, you came up with the plan, you convinced her it could work, and then you just abandoned her.  
  
“That isn’t your fault, Quinn,” she says quietly blinking away tears and looking down at the ground. “Believe me, it isn’t your fault.” While that may be true it doesn’t exactly make you feel any better. You roll over onto your back bringing her hand with yours and resting them both on your stomach. You trace the lines and shapes of her fingers with your own trying to remember them. Trying desperately to remember her.  
  
“Tell me something. Something good. About me, about us.”  
  
“Well what do you wanna know? I’m sure you have tons of questions.” You do, thousands of them, and you decide to go with the obvious one first.  
  
“Does it work, what we do? I mean is it even worth it living like that? Are we even happy?” You feel her sigh more than you hear it.  
  
“It’s rough, yeah. Some days I feel like I can’t breathe. But there’s not a whole lot I wouldn’t trade for one good day with you, Quinn.” She reaches forward and just barely runs her right hand through your hair before bringing it back under her head. You feel the tears prick the back of your eyes again and wonder if they’ll always be there now, just below the surface. “So yeah, for me it’s worth it.”  
  
“And Finn and Noah?” you ask hesitantly.  
  
“My idea actually. You said no the second I brought it up but I argued that it was insanely suspicious for the beautiful rich head cheerleader to be single her whole high school career. People were already talking about the fact that you hadn’t been on a single date our entire freshman year. You became president of the celibacy club as an excuse for it but there were still rumors. So we fought about it and yelled and you said it was crazy and way too fucked up to date some random guy during the day and come back to me at night. But I said that was the way it had to be and you stormed off. A few days later you were waiting at my locker when I got to school, you told me you were sorry and you loved me and that you’d do it. ‘Whatever it takes to keep you’ you said.” A grin creeps over her face as she locks eyes with you. “It was probably one of the most romantic things you’ve ever done, considering it was in the middle of the hallway where anyone could see.” She laughs lightly and squeezes your hand. She tells the whole thing like it’s merely a story she heard somewhere and you know you’re responsible for that. For making her this way, so able to separate herself from her own life and completely detach herself from her feelings at a moment’s notice. In this second you truly _hate_ Quinn Fabray for the first time.  
  
“So I _dated_ them but I never . . .” you can’t bring yourself to actually say the words.  
  
“No,” she assures you. “The celibacy club and your religion were good enough excuses for Finn so you guys stayed together for a little over four months but you barely even saw him outside of school. Noah on the other hand got fed up with it after a few weeks and dumped you.”  
  
“Okay. But, I mean, I’m not still a . . . you know.” She laughs again and shifts your hands so that hers is lying flat on your stomach.  
  
“No, you’re not.”  
  
“And . . . . it was you?” you ask awkwardly. You hate having to even ask it but you’ve been assuming most everything for the last three weeks and it hasn’t really worked out so well for you. You’d like to start being sure of things for once. She smiles gently at you and her eyes scan back and forth over your face. She reaches her right hand out again and smoothes over your cheek with the back of her fingers. You can’t decide if she’s reliving an old memory or trying to make a new one.  
  
“Yeah, it was me,” she finally says. She sighs and pulls her hand back resting her head on it again. “In this very clearing actually.” You furrow your eyebrows and slowly turn your head away from her scanning the clearing and feeling a little creeped out. She laughs like she did that first night and it almost feels like you’ve spent all this time just waiting to hear that again. You turn back to look at her and can’t help laughing too. “I’m kidding. Who has sex in the woods? I mean there’s like innocent bunnies and shit in those trees. It’s way too creepy.”  
  
“Innocent bunnies and shit?” You both bust out laughing again and you can feel the tension slowly drain from the two of you. She leans down to rest her forehead on your shoulder and stretches her arm so that her hand is across your right hip instead of your stomach. After you both finally stop giggling she raises her head slightly to look at you. You idly notice that your right hand is slowing drawing up and down the arm she has resting across you and you wonder when that started.  
  
“It was in my room actually, very traditional. We kinda wanted to have at least one normal thing in our relationship.” She seems to suddenly notice the position the two of you are in and just stares at the arm draped over you and your hand running across it.  
  
“This is weird.”  
  
“Yeah, sorry. I just –“ she starts to pull away from you but you quickly thread your left arm under her and wrap it around her waist to keep her where she is.  
  
“No, I mean, it’s weird that it’s not, ya know.” She smiles and shakes her head.  
  
“What?”  
  
“I mean this should be weird right? I’m not really a very touchy feely person. Not new me anyway. But instead this feels . . . . I don’t know, natural maybe?” You sigh and search for the right words. “That’s not right. It’s more like everything since I woke up has had this kind of forced feel to it. Everything except this. Except you.” She smiles down at you again and relaxes a little so you release your grip on her waist laying your arm back at your side.  
  
“It’s so weird how some parts of you are exactly the same when most of you is gone,” she says quietly. It sounds more like a thought she accidentally voiced than something she meant to say, but you’re thankful that she slipped and said it out loud. All you’ve heard from everyone else since you woke up is how completely different you are now. And while you don’t really want to be the Quinn Fabray that you’ve heard so much about you were still kind of terrified that _nothing_ about you seemed to be the same, like you’d lost every single piece of who you once were.  
  
“Really? Because everyone else seems to think I’m completely different now.”  
  
“Well that’s because they all knew Quinn Fabray, not you.” You consider that, this crazy double life that you apparently led, and you still can’t quite wrap your mind around the idea.  
  
“Tell me the parts that are the same.”  
  
“I will, gladly. But first I’m gonna have to move because this position is kind of killing my neck.” She chuckles and smiles again.  
  
“So lay your head down,” you say simply. It seems like the logical solution to an easy problem. She looks down at you and then herself and finally the small space of blanket between you before turning back to you with questioning eyes. You nod your head toward your shoulder and raise your eyebrows expectantly. She stares at you for a few moments with uncertainty before just _barely_ laying her head on your shoulder. You can tell she’s being extremely careful not to put any weight on you or let any other part of her touch you. For the first time there’s a hint of true awkwardness between you. But instead of being worried like you would be with most anyone else you just smirk and shake your head.  
  
“Well this isn’t going to work.” She starts pulling away again the second you open your mouth.  
  
“Yeah, it’s too much probably –“ again you have to physically stop her, this time grabbing the arm she was pulling off of your waist.  
  
“No - would you stop that? I just meant,” you lift your left arm from where it’s laying between the two of you and bring it over to settle on the blanket behind her. “There. Better.” She scans you up and down for a long moment and when her eyes meet yours again you can see the tears hiding behind them. She moves her hand back to your hip and lays her head on your shoulder again. She’s still being careful though so after a few seconds you just wrap your arm around her back and pull her into you. “Just relax Rach, it’s okay I promise.” And she finally does. You’re both quiet after that, lost in your own thoughts. For the first time you can remember you actually envy Quinn Fabray. For all the bullshit she had to deal with, at least at the end of the day she had this. Rachel pulls you out of your thoughts with a sniff. It’s hushed and drawn out, like she’s crying and trying to hide it. Which would probably work better if she weren’t, you know, lying on top of you. Still, you wait until you can feel her tears on your chest before you say anything. “Hey, you okay?” you ask, gently running the hand on her back from one side to the other.  
  
“Yeah,” she finally says after a few seconds. “It’s just, _this_ . . . . this is the same,” she says quietly and grips you a little tighter.  
  



	7. Chapter 7

You lay with her for a few minutes, neither of you feeling the need to speak just yet. You’re trying to get things into perspective in your head. It feels like your entire life is completely different than it was just an hour ago. Things have finally started falling into the right places and actually making some sense. It’s like ever since you woke up you’ve just been collecting random jigsaw pieces and trying to fit them together but you could never quite get it right. But now Rachel’s shown you the box top and you can see each piece for what it is in the bigger picture. She readjusts her head on your shoulder and it brings you back to reality. A reality where you’re laying in the middle of the woods intertwined with a girl who, technically, you barely even know. You still can’t really get over how _not weird_ this feels. Though you’ve made a friend or two and you’re okay to hang out and talk to them you’re never truly comfortable. Some part of you is always conscious of the fact that you can’t remember. And the fact that they will always have more information than you makes you nervous and anxious, like when someone tells a joke and you’re the only one who didn’t get it. And then there’s Rachel, who seems to know _everything_ about you, who _should_ make you more nervous than anyone. But she just doesn’t. With her it’s like you just know that she’ll never use the information she has against you. She’ll never treat you like ‘Quinn Fabray who’s suddenly naïve and vulnerable’ like Karofsky and the dozens of others who say things you don’t understand and then walk away laughing. She just treats you like Quinn, who happens to have forgotten a few things and sometimes needs to be reminded. Suddenly a random thought hits you.  
  
“It suddenly occurs to me that you’re a girl,” you say, not really thinking about it.  
  
“Umm, you can’t really see it but I’m kind of wearing my offended face right now.” You laugh and realize that yeah, you probably could’ve worded that better.  
  
“No, I mean I always noticed that you were a girl, obviously. I just meant that we’re, ya know, _both_ girls.”  
  
“Ah. My face now looks more understanding than offended.” You laugh again.  
  
“You kinda say odd things,” you tell her almost affectionately.  
  
“ _I_ say odd things? You accused me of prowling around town every night _stealing people’s pants_.”  
  
“Point taken.”  
  
“Exactly.”  
  
“Is it weird that we talked about all that stuff and I’m just now realizing the whole two girls part of it? I mean it’s kind of like _this_ ,” you lightly grip her waist with one hand and her arm with the other, “the whole . . . random cuddling thing.” You feel her laugh quietly against you. “My head is saying that it should be weird or kind of a big deal or something but . . . it just isn’t.”   
  
“Yeah, we’ve always kind of been like that.” She props her elbow underneath her and raises her head up to look at you. “When we first met and then again when we reconnected or whatever, we always just . . . worked. We never really had that sort of awkward hesitant phase you usually do with new people. Even when it turned into more it was kinda seamless.” She smiles at you and shrugs.  
  
“Like we were two halves of a whole?” you say overdramatically with a smirk. She laughs and squeezes your hip.  
  
“No, dork.” She rolls her eyes and you both chuckle again. “I don’t know. For me it was like when you don’t see your best friend for a while.” You stare at her curiously.  
  
“This is my ‘please elaborate’ face,” you offer helpfully. She smiles and shakes her head.  
  
“Always such a smart ass, _that’s_ definitely the same.” You just grin proudly. “ _Anyway_ , what I mean is everybody kind of has that one best friend, that person that just clicks, and you could go years without talking to each other but as soon as you come back together it’s like you were never apart. That natural easy flow is just always there. When I met you . . . . . it felt like getting my best friend back.” An embarrassed grin creeps over her face and she looks down for a few seconds before her eyes finally meet yours again. “I don’t know, it sounds cheesy and embarrassingly Disney Channel,” she laughs under her breath and rolls her eyes again, “but it’s the closest way I know to describe it.” She shrugs again and lays her head back on your shoulder.  
  
“No, it’s good. I mean it _was_ pretty cheesy,” you tease causing her to squeeze your hip again. You can feel the questions finally start nagging at you again so you decide to just ask them.  
  
“So all this time we’ve been together and no one’s ever found out?”  
  
“Nope. And to think most of the glee club thinks I can’t act for shit.” You chuckle at that as you remember hearing that particular remark on one or two occasions.  
  
“If they only knew.”  
  
“It’s really not as difficult as it sounds though.” You scoff and roll your eyes not even caring that she can’t see you.  
  
“Yeah, I’m sure. Secret love affair, alter egos, appearance-maintaining boyfriends, sounds like a piece of cake.” She laughs and nudges your chin with her head.  
  
“Shut up. I just mean that everyone in high school is so busy freaking out about who’s watching them to really pay close attention to anyone else. As long as you put on a decent enough show they don’t ever bother to look behind the curtain.”  
  
“Still though, keeping that up day in and day out for over two years, it can’t possibly be easy.” You feel her take a deep breath and she stays quiet for a few seconds playing with the hem of your shirt.  
  
“No, it’s not easy. It can be kind of brutal sometimes actually. But we don’t really have a choice. Especially not after last year.”  
  
“What happened last year?”  
  
“We broke up,” she says quietly. “It didn’t go so well.”  
  
“Wait, what?” You pick your head up a little to look over at her and she pulls away from you just enough to make eye contact.  
  
“For three weeks.” She curls back into you closer than before, resting her forehead against your neck and wrapping her arm a little further around you. You instinctively tighten your grip around her waist and lean your head toward hers. You wait until you feel her relax a little to ask.  
  
“What happened?” She starts playing with your shirt again and you know she’s trying to keep herself distracted enough to tell the story without feeling it. The knowledge makes your heart ache.  
  
“During lunch one day a cheerleader walked by and knocked my tray up into my face. Food got all over me, it took _forever_ to get the stroganoff out of my hair.” She laughs lightly almost like she’s telling a joke.  
  
“What?” you immediately sit up, as much as you can with Rachel draped across you, propping yourself up on your right elbow. “Are you fucking serious?”  
  
“It’s not a big deal, Quinn.” She says casually and leans against you trying to get you to lie back down.   
  
“No, stop.” You gently brush her completely off of you and you both sit up fully. “They just do this shit to you in the middle of fucking school?”   
  
“Calm down okay?” She moves to look you straight in the eye and puts a hand on your shoulder near your neck dragging her thumb up and down your collarbone. You feel yourself start to relax almost immediately, must be something she learned with the old you. “I mean, yeah it’s not exactly fun, but it’s _really not a big deal_.” You sigh and decide to just let it go. You don’t think you even have enough energy to maintain your anger over it for long anyway.  
  
“That’s really unfair by the way,” you tell her, nodding your head toward the hand on your shoulder. She just laughs and smiles at you, moving her hand from your shoulder back to her lap.  
  
“Well it worked didn’t it?” The two of you are now sitting just a few inches away from each other but you’re no longer touching. You take the opportunity to stretch and pop your back, giving yourself a few seconds to calm back down. ‘Doesn’t condone shenanigans, my ass’ you think to yourself but decide against saying it out loud. What kind of principal just allows shit like that to happen in his school all the time? You realize this is pretty much the opposite of calming down and take a few deep breaths deciding again to let it go.  
  
“Sorry I got upset. It just kind of . . . well, pissed me off, obviously.” She chuckles and gives you a knowing look.  
  
“Yeah it always has. It’s what we fought about that day actually.” Her expression gets more serious and you remember what started this discussion in the first place.  
  
“Right. So what happened then?” She looks down and starts playing with the seam on her jeans, distracting herself from the story again.  
  
“Well apparently you saw the whole thing and a few minutes after the bell rang for the end of lunch you came into the bathroom where I was and locked the door. You just stood there watching me clean myself up and by the time I was done a few minutes later you were crying. You said that,” she pauses and takes a deep breath trying to compose herself, “you said you couldn’t do it anymore. That it was, it was too painful and you . . . . you never should have started it in the first place.” She’s given up the pretense of keeping her hands busy altogether and she looks like she can barely even get the words out. You reach over and grab her right hand with your left, lacing your fingers together.  
  
“You don’t have to tell me, Rach. It’s okay.” You’re starting to regret even asking about it in the first place. She grips your hand tightly and squeezes her eyes shut for a few seconds taking a couple more deep breaths. Eventually she starts to relax and her grip on your hand loosens some. She clears her throat and lifts her head back up to face you and she’s almost the same smiling laughing Rachel from a few minutes ago. When she starts talking again it’s with the same disconnected storyteller quality that she used before.  
  
“It’s always weighed a lot heavier on you, the things we do to each other. You used to torture yourself over it. I told you that I knew what I was getting into same as you and to stop worrying about me, but you wouldn’t listen, just said it was too much and we had to stop it now before it killed us both. Then you told me it was over and you left.” She sighs and flips your hands over on her leg, staring down at your palm and tracing the lines of it with her fingers. “I thought I knew ya know, what it was like not being with you. I mean there were times when we didn’t see each other for over two weeks, not as Quinn and Rachel anyway. But it was different. It was always hell not seeing you, but knowing you were still mine at the end of the day somehow made it easier to handle. So when you weren’t,” she trails off and turns her head to look you in the eye, “it was torture, for both of us.” She stops talking for a moment and just stares into your eyes remembering before she snaps herself out of it and gives you that half smile. “So twenty-three days later I got a text during fourth period from some random number to meet you, in that same bathroom we were in earlier actually.”  
  
“Wait, why from some random number?”  
  
“Oh, uh, sometimes we’d text each other to set up a meet but we couldn’t ever use our own phones to send it in case we slipped up somewhere and made your parents suspicious enough to check your phone records.”  
  
“Jesus. We sound like fucking drug dealers.” She chuckles and raises her eyebrows in agreement. “And what is it with us and big dramatic moments in bathrooms?” She laughs a little louder and smiles at you.  
  
“I have no idea. You used to say bathrooms were our McElevators.” She must be able to see the question in your eyes because she explains without you having to even ask. “It’s a TV show reference, you’re a little bit of a TV junkie. It’s actually kind of clever if you know the story.” You nod in understanding and a smirk makes its way across your face.  
  
“Well I _am_ pretty damn clever.” She just rolls her eyes and shakes her head. “So what happened?”  
  
“I met you and we both agreed that we were too far in to try and get out now. We had to keep going the way we were, the alternative was more painful than anything anyone else could do to us.” She laces your fingers together again and starts rubbing the thumb of her other hand across the back of yours. You still can’t really wrap your mind around it; the double life, the evil parents, the tragic love. It sounds like a farfetched movie or a cheesy romance novel.  
  
“I still can’t believe this was my life, our life,” you admit. “It just sounds too crazy.” She laughs and leans into you for a few seconds before pulling away.  
  
“I know,” she says shaking her head. “There were days when I was _sure_ I’d completely lost my mind and it was all just some insane fantasy I’d cooked up in a padded room somewhere.” You both laugh and you untangle your left hand from hers and place it on the blanket behind her resting your weight on it. She leans into you and lays her head on your shoulder again and you rest your head on top of hers. You just sit for a little while enjoying the contact and the peace that always seems to come with it. Eventually though, like always, your curiosity gets the better of you.  
  
“Are the Fabrays really that bad?”   
  
“Well the only thing the Fabrays love more than shirking their parental responsibilities is their money and boarding school is expensive. So as long as you keep in line and do what they want they’ll save the money and keep you in public school. But the second they feel like you’re causing problems or making them look bad they’ll gladly ship you off somewhere to keep you from tarnishing their precious image.” You’re not shocked exactly, every encounter you’ve had with the Fabrays completely supports what she just said, but still you can’t help but feel disappointed. Like some small part of you was hoping that even though they were cold and distant that deep down they were still good people, that they were still parents that actually _cared_ about their children. You force yourself not to dwell on it now, not wanting the mood to become heavy again.  
  
“So why are they so against you?” You feel her breath against your neck as she scoffs.  
  
“I’m the Jewish, outspoken, know-it-all daughter of an interracial gay couple. I’m pretty sure they’re convinced that they’d burst into flames if they so much as nodded my way when we passed each other on the street,” she laughs quietly at the absurdity of it and you can’t help but grin yourself. “But it’s not just them. We live in a small town practically in the middle of the Bible belt. If the people here knew, they’d tear us to shreds. I mean it’s one thing for Brittany and Santana to hang all over each other and tell all the boys that they make out and have sex all the time behind closed doors. But if anybody even suspected there was something real between them the whole school would turn on them in a heartbeat.”  
  
“Is there? Something real between them?”  
  
“You always thought so, to some extent at least.”  
  
“Huh. That’s pretty fucked up.”  
  
“Yeah.” You shift your head against hers and suddenly you get a faint whiff of something. You can’t decide if it’s her shampoo or her perfume but something about it just feels _familiar_ and something else you can’t quite name. You have the sudden impulse to cling to her desperately and beg her to never leave your side again, you’re positive that she’s the best chance you’ll ever get at remembering who you are. But instead you just scoot a little closer to her and reach your right hand over to grab hers, your fingers threading together instantly like you barely even have a choice in the matter.  
  
“Tell me something about you, something no one else knows.”  
  
“Hmm, let’s see. Well I’m kind of a comic book geek.”  
  
“Why am I not really surprised by that?” you tease her chuckling and she gently slaps your leg with your joined hands.  
  
“It’s not like I’ve got boxes of them in the basement all individually wrapped in protective plastic or something. Actually it’s not so much the comic books as it is the cartoons based on them. I used to watch them all the time when I was a kid and I still kind of keep up with the stories and the mythology.”  
  
“Really? I was given the impression that _the stage_ was your entire life,” you question only half serious.  
  
“Don’t get me wrong, it _is_ a very big part of my life and I do own two copies of the two-disc special edition DVD release of the musical Funny Girl; one to watch and one to keep as a collector’s item.” You smile and laugh. “And ever since I can remember it’s been my dream to be on Broadway singing my heart out to a theater full of people.” You turn your head a little more toward hers and smile into her hair. “But I’m still a teenage girl. I watch TV and play games on Facebook and listen to Britney Spears and Taylor Swift. Everyone at school thinks that just because I’m passionate about performing that it must be my entire life. But nobody can live their whole life for one purpose, they’d go crazy.” You consider it for a moment and murmur your agreement.  
  
“Okay, occasionally geeky but mostly normal, got it. Tell me more.”  
  
“So demanding,” she teases. “Umm, I hate milkshakes, I know how to drive a stick shift, I simply _cannot_ whistle despite numerous attempts on your part to teach me, I’ve always really wanted to spend a few months in Ireland at some point in my life, I’m terrible at accents – you’re pretty good at them though.”  
  
“Really?”  
  
“Uh-huh. At least you used to be. I don’t know if the amnesia would affect that or not.” You’re both silent for a few awkward seconds, her expecting you to try it and you reluctant to do so fearing you’ll fail spectacularly at it, before you both bust out laughing at yourselves. “Anyway,” she says, her laughter not quite gone, “you could do like four or five of them really well. The British one was always your best though.”  
  
“Huh. Was that something that I like practiced for some reason or . . .” She pulls her hand out of yours and sits up straight stretching her neck and straightening her legs out and leans back on both hands. You straighten up and stretch a bit yourself, shifting around to face her before leaning on your left arm again and bending your right leg up to rest your other arm on top of it.  
  
“You never really practiced it necessarily,” she answers after you’ve both gotten comfortable again, “it was always kinda just something you could do. You’re a pretty decent mimic in general actually,” she says offhandedly and you raise an eyebrow at her.  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
“Well you pick things up really easily, like the accents, and sports, I don’t think you’ve found one yet that you’re not at least somewhat decent at,” she says with a smirk. “Also dancing and singing, you pretty much just have to see a move or hear a line once, maybe twice, before you can repeat it perfectly. You can figure out how to play most any standard run-of-the-mill song on the piano _by ear_ within an _hour_ even though you’ve never had lessons. And you’ve always been good at school without a whole lot of effort because you just retain information really well.” She tilts her head to the side with a grin and shrugs. Now that you think about it almost as soon as Tina sat down with you last week and you finally stopped stressing out and just relaxed you didn’t have _nearly_ as much trouble studying as you had before. In fact, once you had the rest of your classes in order you ended up not even needing a Spanish tutor, you just spent a night or two reading through the book and basically caught yourself up. And you seem to be pretty much the only person in your entire English class that even remotely comprehends Shakespeare although you can’t understand why that is. It makes perfect sense to you as long as you take the effort to _actually_ read it.  
  
“I gotta say . . . . that sounds kinda fuckin’ awesome.” Rachel laughs at that and you join in with her.   
  
“Yeah, I’ve always been a little jealous of the fact that things seem to come so easy to you,” she admits. “Spanish is kind of kicking my ass a little bit. It’s the grammatical gender stuff mostly. I mean why the _hell_ is table always female and book always male anyway? It’s ridiculous! They’re fucking _inanimate objects_ , they have no gender!!” You raise your eyebrows in surprise at the random outburst and can’t quite suppress the laugh that follows.  
  
“Wow. How do you _really_ feel about it, Rach? Don’t hold anything back now.” Something flashes across her face for just a second but it’s gone so quickly that you’re not quite sure it even happened.  
  
“Don’t mock me,” she suddenly pouts sticking her bottom lip out and kicking halfheartedly at your leg looking absolutely adorable. “Spanish people are evil, see also Santana Lopez.” You don’t even bother trying to suppress the laugh that causes and she just scrunches her eyebrows together and frowns at you even more.  
  
“Aww, I’m sorry,” you lean over toward her and bring your right hand up to the side of her face running your thumb over the lip she still has sticking out, “you’re right, Spanish is stupid.” It’s not until you lean forward, placing a quick kiss to her forehead and smiling, that you realize what the hell you’re doing. You quickly pull back enough to see her face and her eyes are wide and panicked. “Shit. I’m sorry.” You lean away from her like you’ve been burned and just stare at your hand for a moment in confusion before closing it into a fist and dropping it to your side. Despite how close and comfortable you’ve been with each other today part of you instantly knows that _that_ was something almost completely different and it was definitely the wrong move to make. “Fuck, I’m so sorry, Rachel. I . . . I don’t even know why I did that,” you tell her honestly. “It’s like, like it just happened. I didn’t even realize what I was _doing_ until I . . . .” you trail off running a hand over your face and inhaling deeply. It’s like your body just reacted, made the decision and moved without even consulting you. You stare off to the side at nothing trying to figure out what the hell just happened and praying to any god that will listen to you that you didn’t just fuck everything up.  
  
“No, it’s uh,” she clears her throat and sits up, “it’s fine.” You turn your attention back to her as you hear the words but she still looks pretty freaked out and like things are definitely _not_ fine. You start to feel terrified that you just screwed up the one truly good thing in your life. The two of you sit in complete silence practically frozen in place for nearly a minute until she quickly stands up and clears her throat again. “It’s getting late so we should, we should probably go.” She nods her head in the direction of the path that will lead you back through the woods and to her car. You nod slowly and stand up stepping off of the blanket as she bends down to collect it. You just stand and watch as she quickly folds it and straightens back up tucking it under her arm. Then you’re just staring at each other, your eyes pleading and hers sad and resigned. Finally she sighs and starts walking toward the path behind you.  
  
“What happens now?” you ask quietly as she passes you, your voice sounding a lot more helpless than you meant it to. She stops walking and turns her head to look up at you, standing only a foot to your right.  
  
“I take you home,” she says plainly. “Well actually I’ll have to drop you off a street or two away and then you’ll have to walk home.” She tries for a small grin but it looks completely wrong.  
  
“No, I mean . . . what happens? What do we do now, Rach?” She looks at you for a moment almost surprised before she responds.  
  
“What do you mean? We don’t do anything, Quinn. Nothing changes.” She says it like she wasn’t even expecting to have to discuss it, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. You take a second to try and figure out exactly what she’s saying.  
  
“So we go back to how it used to be before? Ya know, fighting at school and meeting up when we can?”  
  
“What?” She furrows her eyebrows and just barely shakes her head. “No, Quinn. We go back to how it’s been the last two weeks. We avoid each other if at all possible and we don’t meet up again.”  
  
“What? You mean like not for a few days, right?” She looks at you curiously and drags her teeth across her bottom lip.  
  
“No, not ever. It was a big enough risk me bringing you out here today.” Her voice is slow and even like she’s simply reminding you of something that she’s sure you’ll remember any second now. And while she may be calm, you on the other hand are starting to panic. You can feel your heart speeding up and your breath threatening to get shaky. You take a few steps backwards trying to get far enough away from her to think. When that doesn’t work you press the heels of your hands to your eyes and take a deep breath trying to slow your brain down enough to form some sort of coherent response.  
  
“Okay, wait,” you finally manage to say, letting your hands fall to your sides where they clench into tight fists. “You’re saying we just go back to school tomorrow and pretend like this whole thing never happened?” you ask simply but inside your head you’re screaming at her, begging her to tell you that you heard her wrong or misunderstood her somehow. But when you hear her sigh heavily and you see that familiar exhausted look on her face you know that you understood her perfectly.   
  
“That’s the way it has to be, Quinn.” She gives you that same look she gives at the beginning of all your fights, the one that pleads with you to just give in now and accept what she’s telling you. You think for a second that maybe she doesn’t quite know you as well as both of you think. If she did then she’d know better than to even _suggest_ you give in, not about this.  
  
“Look, I get that today was risky and, yeah, we should probably lay low for a little while,” you say calmly, deciding not to jump directly to anger like you usually do since it never seems to work out that well. You take a step back toward her and look her straight in the eye. “But I can’t go back to how things were before, Rachel. I can’t just pretend that today didn’t happen. I _won’t_.” You give her your own look, begging her to back down just this once. You’ll let her win every fight for the next ten years; she just has to give you this one. You’re _finally_ starting to get some semblance of your life back and you’ll be damned if you’ll let her take it away now. But she just closes her eyes and hangs her head, tossing the blanket on the ground beside her.  
  
“I’m sorry,” she says looking back up at you, her face almost completely expressionless, “but it’s the only option.”  
  
“No. Fuck that. It’s _not_ the only option, Rach.” She laughs under her breath but it’s empty and cold.  
  
“And what the _fuck_ would you know about our options, Quinn?” she says mockingly looking more than a little pissed off. Good, you think to yourself, you were starting to find the whole ‘calm and rational’ approach to be a bit overrated anyway.  
  
“I know that we made it work before.”  
  
“No, you don’t know _shit_! You know what I tell you, facts and information. But you don’t know the first _goddamn thing about it_!” She’s yelling now, pacing around and gesturing almost wildly at you, and some small part of you says that means you have a chance of winning this.  
  
“Fuck you, Rachel. I don’t know anything about it? Fucking enlighten me then.” She stalks over to you and stops just a few inches away. Her voice is low and harsh and you barely even recognize her.  
  
“ _Enlighten you_? You can’t _ever_ know what it was like, Quinn. Yeah, now you know the story and you can imagine and sympathize and all that other bullshit, but you won’t ever _understand_ what it was like for us.” The anger is still there but already she’s starting to lose it. You’re both too tired from the last month – maybe the last lifetime – to keep this up for long.  
  
“So _make_ me understand, Rachel,” you plead with her but she just rolls her eyes and scoffs before turning and walking away from you. “Teach me how to be like we were. We did it for _two years_ , we can do it again!”  
  
“No we can’t!” she snaps spinning around to face you. “Don’t you _get_ that? It was always _you_ who made this work before! _You’re_ the one who knows them, knows how they think, knows what we can get away with and what we can’t. _You’re_ the one who taught _me_! And I know all the rules and damn near every play in the book, but . . . . . but I just _can’t_ play the game like you could. I don’t know what the right shots are to call, I never have.” You stare at each other for a few seconds before she seems to just crumple right in front of you, finally losing the last of her fight. When she speaks again her voice is quiet and almost defeated. “So no, I can’t teach you, Quinn. And we can’t be like we were before. Quinn and Rachel _cannot exist_ without Quinn Fabray and Rachel Berry.” She drops her head and runs her hands up into her hair and you take a few slow steps her way stopping a good five feet from her. You wait nearly a minute before you speak, simply at a loss as to what to even say.  
  
“So what do we do now, Rachel?” you ask quietly, sounding a little defeated yourself. She finally lifts her gaze to meet yours looking tired and somehow smaller than she’s ever seemed before.  
  
“We do what we’ve done for the last three weeks, we keep our heads down and bear through it. Tomorrow we’ll go to school and I’ll be Rachel Berry and you’ll be,” she pauses for a second and gestures toward you with the slightest hint of something almost like a smirk, “whoever the hell you are now. And we’ll avoid each other or we’ll fight.” She shrugs and her eyes tell you you’re not the only one who’s at a loss. “It’s all we’ve got left, Quinn.”  
  
“But what’s the point now? I mean why even keep up this charade of intense hatred if . . .” you suddenly feel dizzy for just a second and the air rushes out of your lungs like you’ve just been punched in the stomach. Rachel gives you a sad sympathetic look and you _finally_ understand what always caused this feeling in her. It was the realization that what you desperately needed was right in front of you but you couldn’t ever have it. You feel tears rush up behind your eyes and it’s all you can do to stop them from spilling over. “Why keep it up if . . . . if there’s nothing to throw suspicion from anymore? If this is,” you raise a hand pointing back and forth between the two of you and blinking the tears back, “if it’s done then why can’t we just _be_?” She slowly glances around the clearing before settling her gaze back on you and shaking her head.  
  
“No, we have to maintain. Me especially since you really can’t anymore,” she says simply.  
  
“But why, Rachel? I’m not saying we should suddenly be joined at the hip like Brittany and Santana, just that we don’t have to keep fighting and making each other’s lives miserable. There’s no reason to keep playing the game when there’s nothing left to win. You don’t even have to be Rachel Berry anymore, you can finally just be _you_.”  
  
“No,” she says a little more forcefully with a hint of determination in her eyes. “We have to keep going the way we are so that we’ll still be safe when this is all over.” You open your mouth to ask her what the hell she’s talking about when you suddenly realize exactly what she means. Almost instantly you feel your heart start breaking. She’s saying you have to keep the whole thing going so that when you get your memories back the two of you can pick right back up where you left off. She’s still clinging to that last desperate strand of hope that one day you’ll wake up and it will be like none of this ever happened. A tear breaks free and rolls down your cheek before you can even think to stop it.  
  
“Rach . . .” you say softly taking a small step in her direction, but she must be able to tell what you’re thinking because she immediately throws her hands up to stop you and cuts you off.  
  
“Don’t.” Her eyes are almost pleading again and her voice sounds tight. “We _have_ to keep going. Because when you’re Quinn Fabray again you’ll need me to be Rachel Berry.”  
  
“Rachel,” you try again gently but it seems to be the last little nudge she needed to send her tumbling off of whatever fragile ledge she was balancing on.  
  
“Don’t! Don’t you dare fucking say it!” she yells almost hysterically and in an instant her eyes are swimming with tears of her own. “ _Please_ just _stop_ fucking saying it,” she practically begs you as the tears start to fall. “They’ll come back, they _have_ to,” she says more to herself than you. You try to take another step toward her but she raises her hands again and takes a step away from you instead. “No, stop. Don’t you realize what you’re saying? What it means? If it never happens then all of this, the last _two years_ ,” her breathing starts to sound jagged and the tears are flowing down her face now, “it’s all for _nothing_.” Her voice is getting shaky and harder to understand like she has to force the words out. You feel your own tears start dripping from your chin and notice that you’re crying almost as hard as she is. “Then _everything_ we did, torturing each other, putting, putting ourselves through _fucking hell_ . . . . all of it was pointless. N-none, none of it even mattered because _I still lost you_.” Anguish washes over her face and she slams her eyes shut taking in shallow ragged breaths. It feels like your heart is being ripped into pieces and you move forward again until you’re just a few inches from her. You move to put your hands on either side of her face and make her look at you but decide against it just before you make contact and unwillingly drop your hands back to your side. Every time you’ve tried to get closer to her she’s stopped you and you don’t want to risk making this any harder on her than it already is.  
  
“Look at me,” you say quietly, noticing that your own voice is starting to lose its strength as well. “Rachel, _please_ look at me.” You know she can hear the desperation in your voice just as clearly as you can so she tries for another deep breath before opening her eyes and looking up at you. “I’m right here Rach. You didn’t lose me I promise. _I’m still here_ ,” you tell her as earnestly as you possibly can, bringing your right hand up to your chest and gripping your shirt tightly to keep yourself from reaching out for her. Pain flashes over her face again as she breaks your gaze and drops her head and you fucking _loathe_ yourself for not knowing how to help her.  
  
“No, you’re not,” you hear her say, her voice sounding almost hollow and her eyes still locked on the ground. “Don’t you understand? I don’t even . . . I don’t even know how or why it happened the first time. But there’s no way it can happen again. There’s just,” she gets more and more quiet with every word she says until she’s barely even whispering and you have to strain just to hear her. “There’s just no way it happens again.”  
  
“What won’t happen, Rach?” After a moment that feels like hours she lifts her head back up but she can’t manage to look at you for more than a few seconds before shifting her gaze back to the ground. “What won’t happen, Rachel?” you ask so quietly you’re not even sure you actually said it.   
  
“There’s no way this works twice, Quinn.” You can practically feel her shaking in front of you with the effort of holding in her sobs. When one finally manages to escape it’s almost immediately followed by one of your own. “There’s no way you choose me twice.” The absolute certainty in her voice is the thing that finally breaks you. The instant the words are out of her mouth you reach out and pull her to you. She practically collapses into you laying her head against your chest and curling her arms around you. You wrap one arm tightly across her lower back and bring your other hand up between her shoulder blades clinging to her and wishing like hell you knew how to protect her from all of this, that you weren’t the thing she needs protection from. She finally lets go of everything then, hands digging almost painfully into your back and sobs nearly tearing through her. You know that she’s not just crying for today or even the last month but for all of it. For every second of pain and heartache that she was never allowed to show, for every time she was breaking inside but couldn’t bear to burden you with it, and for the future she’s been desperately waiting for, the chance to finally be free and happy and _together_ , that’s now been ripped away from her. You hold her a little tighter and lean your head down to rest against hers knowing there’s nothing you can do now but wait the tears out with her. You can’t believe that just a few minutes ago you thought that you could actually _win_ this. If there’s one thing you should know by now it’s that every time you and Rachel fight, somehow you both always lose. It feels like the two of you stand there for days before her shaking starts to subside and her breathing finally begins to even out.  
  
“You are the _only choice_ I could _ever_ make, Rachel,” you whisper into her hair like you’ve never meant anything more in your entire life, desperately needing her to believe it. “We’ll get through this. We’ll figure something out, okay. I promise.”


	8. Chapter 8

It’s been eight days since Rachel told you, since the clouds hanging over you for the last month finally parted only to reveal that you were in the eye of the storm with devastation surrounding you on all sides. Most of the time you can’t manage to feel anything other than numb. You’re pulling away from everyone and you spend nearly every minute trapped in your own head. You don’t joke around with Matt and last Thursday you told Tina you appreciated everything but she didn’t need to tutor you anymore.

After you both got your emotions under control at the clearing Rachel went back to insisting that this was the way things had to be and you didn’t have a better solution or the strength left to fight her. You spent all night Tuesday running through everything and trying to make it work somehow or at least come up with something even resembling a plan. But she was right; it just couldn’t work. Even if she _did_ know how to play the game you’re still in the dark about too many things and it was incredibly likely that one of you would slip up somewhere, probably sooner rather than later. It would just be too much of a risk. Of course knowing that still didn’t stop it from hurting like hell and making you feel like you might never breathe properly again. The only other argument you could come up with was that you weren’t ever getting your memories back and the two of you couldn’t exactly just stay in this limbo forever, but you know you couldn’t ever bear to actually say it to her. Not when you know it’s the only thing she has left to keep her going.  
  
Rachel doesn’t speak to you or even look your way now unless a situation absolutely forces her to, like when Mr. Schuester tried to pair everyone up Thursday morning to have actual conversations in Spanish and help each other with pronunciation. When he called your name as Rachel’s partner the two of you finally locked eyes for the first time since you stepped out of her car Tuesday evening. You barely lasted an entire second before you felt your heart start shattering again and tore your eyes away from her, turning to Schuester with a simple ‘no’ and retreating back into yourself.  
  
Glee is torture and heaven at the same time. Now you finally understand why Quinn Fabray joined this club in the first place, it’s almost like an entirely different world. In the music room Santana laughs at Artie’s jokes and Brittany gossips with Kurt, Noah dances over to Tina and grabs her hand and spins her around with a smile and no one thinks twice about it. You and Rachel can catch each other’s eye and smile while everyone is singing and dancing around you and no one even notices, and in that moment it _almost_ feels like you’re Rachel and Quinn again. But the song always ends. You’ve started to live for those moments and be completely terrified of them at the same time. It’s almost like you need the pain that comes when the moment is over to prove to yourself that the whole thing is real, that it’s not all just some crazy story you’ve concocted in your head.  
  
“Hey funny girl, how are ya?” Matt says with a smile when you take your seat in his car to go to school.  
  
“Fine,” you respond without even looking his way and immediately reach to turn the radio up just like you have every time you’ve been in his car since Rachel told you. You need the distraction to keep you from doing something stupid like bursting into tears and telling him everything. He nods slowly and just stares at the steering wheel for a few seconds before shutting the radio off completely and turning to face you. You start pleading with him in your head to _please_ just let it go and not ask. You don’t know if you can handle it if he actually asks you.  
  
“Quinn.” You don’t even look at him. Instead you focus on the hands in your lap trying to keep them from shaking like you know they want to. “Hey. Will you look at me please?” You just keep staring down for a moment but it’s obvious he’s not going to let this go so slowly you turn your head to look at him. “Are you okay?” he asks and you can see the worry all over his face. ‘No!’ you want to scream at him, ‘I am _not_ okay I am fucking _drowning_ here! I’m stuck in some goddamn modern day Romeo and Juliet except I can’t ever close the fucking book and I’m too much of a coward to even choose the knife or the poison!’ But of course you can’t say any of that. So you take a deep breath and try for a small smile hoping like hell it looks even a little bit convincing. It doesn’t if the look on Matt’s face is any indication.  
  
“Yeah, I’m okay. Just, just a rough couple of days is all.” You can tell he doesn’t believe you so you reach over and lay your hand on his knee. “I’m fine, Matt, really. I’m just trying to work through a few things.” You can feel your hand is about to start shaking again so you quickly pull it away from him and cross your arms before he can notice.  
  
“Okay,” he finally relents with a sigh and puts the car in reverse. He drives for two or three minutes in silence before looking over at you with a sad expression and reaching forward to turn the radio back on. It’s all you can do to not sigh loudly in relief and slump back into your seat.  
  


 

***************

  
  
  
You’re running out of things to keep you distracted in Spanish. You spent most of last week flipping through your book and doing the lessons you knew Schuester would eventually assign, but now you’re almost two weeks ahead and you don’t want to risk getting mixed up by starting the work for the next chapter before you take the final test for this one. Monday you tried drawing to pass the time but everything that popped in your head was somehow related to her and by the end of class you had a paper full of music notes, superheroes, and tiny whistling leprechauns. Tuesday you brought the iPod from your room that you’d finally figured out how to operate and threaded one of the headphones up through the sleeve of your hoodie like you’d seen just about everyone do in your English class every day. In the end though you decided it was more trouble than it was worth, as you had to keep adjusting the volume every thirty seconds scared that Schuester would hear it and you’d get into trouble. Or worse he’d keep you after class for another heart-to-heart.  
  
Today you’re sitting with your hands in the pockets of your jeans and staring at your watch laid out on the desk in front of you. You’re trying to decide whether or not you could actually put the thing back together if you took it apart. You take a quarter out of your pocket and absentmindedly start playing with it while you stare at the watch trying to imagine what the inside of it looks like. You glance over at Rachel like you do every five minutes and you see that for the first time in days she’s actually looking your way, but she’s not staring at _you_ so much as your right hand that’s hovering over your desk. The look on her face is something new but almost familiar and you can’t quite decipher it. You look down and notice that at some point you’ve started walking the quarter over the top of your knuckles again and again. As soon as you start to concentrate on it however you lose your rhythm and the coin falls to your desk clattering loudly. You look back at Rachel and her eyes move up to yours for just a second before darting back to her textbook and staying there for the rest of class. You try for the next hour to fit the pieces back into your watch but no matter how you try it you can’t seem to get it right. Even though you have all the parts and you know how they were arranged before they simply won’t fit back together and work like they used to.  
  


 

***************

  
  
  
In Glee you notice something is definitely _off_ about Rachel. She’s much more quiet than usual and she seems almost twitchy at times. Schuester is caught up in one of his speeches about the true meaning of Glee Club and how important a role it can play in each of your lives so you figure that if anyone else has even noticed her behavior they’ve just assumed she’s nervous about Sectionals, which are just a little more than a week away, but you know better.

She keeps tapping her fingers on her knee and glancing across the room at you nearly every thirty seconds from her chair in the front right corner of the group almost against the wall, just staring for a few moments before turning her head back towards the front of the room and taking a slow deep breath. You’re in your usual spot sitting on the first step but to the left of the group and angled toward them slightly so you can see everyone. Your positions give you a perfect eye line through the people between you and you just watch her curiously trying to figure out what the hell is going on. When you finally manage to catch her eye long enough to ask the question with your own her gaze instantly snaps off to the side before she blinks rapidly a few times and turns to look straight ahead again. You can’t help but grin a little and raise an eyebrow in amusement.

For the first time in days you feel the constant weight of everything start to lift from you as you find a new and much less overwhelming mystery to solve. You keep watching her looking for some sort of clue and trying to work out if something you did has caused this and if so then what it was. The next time she looks your way her eyes dart to your mouth where you’re biting your lip in concentration. She rolls her eyes looking almost annoyed and turns away from you again, just barely shaking her head and visibly scoffing under her breath. She sits up a little straighter and crosses her legs at the knee, her right foot starting to shake back and forth. “Holy shit,” you whisper to yourself as you finally put together what exactly is wrong with her. “Well _that’s_ new.”  
  
“You say something?” Artie suddenly asks softly leaning back towards you. You give him a slightly embarrassed grin and shake your head  
  
“No, nothing. Sorry.” He stares at you for another second before leaning back away from you and curling his arm around Tina’s shoulders again.  
  
You focus your attention back on what you now understand to be a very frustrated Rachel Berry and you feel the grin on your face change from embarrassed to smug. Surprisingly enough the sexual aspect of your relationship hasn’t even really occurred to you until now. You knew that sex was a part of it obviously and the two of you had even touched on the subject briefly in the woods, but your mind’s been too focused on the drama and heartbreak of the entire situation to really even consider much else. You do the math in your head and figure it’s been _at the least_ a little over a month since she got any, probably even longer than that what with the almost sporadic nature of your relationship, so you can’t really blame her. But of course that doesn’t mean you’re just going to let it go either.

You wait for her to look your way again and when she does you give her a knowing look and quickly rake your eyes down her before settling them back on her face and pulling your bottom lip into your mouth to drag your teeth over it. She sits completely still for a few seconds before something like a warning flashes into her eyes and she turns away again, slowly twisting her head to the side to stretch her neck and absentmindedly running her tongue over her lips. Your grin turns into a full-blown smile and you can’t help but laugh quietly under your breath. After all the angst and hopelessness of the last week it’s an incredible relief for the two of you to finally just be two teenage girls for a few minutes, covertly teasing each other across a crowded room without worrying about who might see you and if they did would they be able to somehow figure everything out and then tell all the wrong people.

Instead, just for a minute, you let yourself believe that after Glee is done you’ll walk over and settle your hands on her hips with a smirk and she’ll cross her arms and raise an eyebrow at you, going for disapproving but not quite pulling it off. She’ll smack your arm trying to hold back her grin and tell you that you’re terrible and you’ll argue that you both know she kinda loves it with a wink before giving her a quick kiss and leading her out the door. The sound of everyone suddenly moving around startles you out of your daydream, apparently Schuester is dismissing you early without any actual rehearsal because he has somewhere he needs to be. You glance over at Rachel and the smile still on your face falls when you see nothing but an empty chair. You look up just in time to see her hurry out of the room and immediately all the weight comes crashing back down on you. You really should know by now that the pain is inevitable, that it _always_ floods back in to wash away any foolish notion of happiness. Even still you can’t help but feel it every single time. Like a knife steadily twisting in your gut. Or a slow acting poison scorching through your veins.


	9. Chapter 9

Over the last five days you’ve learned that you prefer Jack Daniels over all the alcohol stored in the Fabrays very well stocked liquor cabinet. You’re not sure why since it’s a lot harsher than most of the others and some nights you have to practically force it down, but every time you try something else you always end up with Jack at the end of the night. You think perhaps it’s just because it’s what you drank that first night so maybe there’s a bit of nostalgia attached to it. As much nostalgia as someone with amnesia can have anyways. The last five days have also taught you that the Fabrays are so unobservant about what happens _in_ their home – and often drunk themselves – that you could probably take an entire bottle from the cabinet every other night and they wouldn’t even notice for weeks. You don’t of course; you only take a few shots every night, just enough to make the daydreams a little less painful. Before the dreams only came late at night when you closed your eyes, but ever since that moment in the music room Wednesday afternoon they’re almost constant. Sometimes the two of you are just laughing and smiling in the halls between classes, sometimes you take her out somewhere on an actual date for what you’re sure would be the first time. But always you’re just Quinn and Rachel and you never care who might see you or what they might think, you’re just happy and unworried and together.  
  
The idea of drinking had entered your mind once or twice since everything fell apart in the woods but it wasn’t until Wednesday night, when you laid in your room for hours with pictures flashing through your head of a Rachel that you could never have, that you finally acted on it. After a few drinks the daydreams still came but you could almost just sit back and enjoy them rather than be agonized over the fact that they could never be reality. Thursday taught you that you have to sober up a bit before you fall asleep or the next day is even more torturous than usual, and that Quinn Fabray apparently also used to drink the pain away every now and then. Often enough at least for Rachel to almost instantly understand why you walked into Spanish that morning a little slower than usual and with bloodshot eyes and to give you a slightly sympathetic but mostly heartbroken look. Every night since has been more of the same; when the daydreams finally get to be too much you go downstairs and pour yourself a glass and drink it in your room while your iPod shuffles through song after song. You can see that Matt, Tina, and Artie can tell that something is wrong and that they’re worried about you but they don’t ever ask and you couldn’t really answer even if they did.  
  
You figured the weekend would be your undoing with nothing to distract you or keep the dreams at bay, but Friday afternoon Schuester pulled you aside after Glee for a one-on-one talk that you actually ended up being quite thankful for. He seemed to have noticed you pulling away and keeping to yourself more and thought that maybe performing something could help you express your emotions better and work through whatever was weighing you down. He was clueless and naïve but you could tell he meant well and was genuinely trying to help so you gave him a smile and said you’d work on something over the weekend and have it ready for Monday. Friday night as you sat in your room with a glass of Jack in your hand you tried to really listen to the songs that were being played and find one that you might want to perform. In the end there were a few that you decided to keep in mind as possibilities but none that really stood out. It wasn’t until halfway through Saturday that you finally found the right song, the music was sad yet almost angry at points and the lyrics hit so close to home that you felt like you could’ve written them yourself. It turns out Rachel was right and it only took you a couple of hours to figure out how to play it on the piano. You spent the rest of Saturday practicing just playing the song and most of Sunday practicing singing it _while_ you played without screwing any of it up. The flashes of a happy Rachel and Quinn still plagued you but they were almost bearable during the day and you only needed half a glass every night.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
When you and Matt walk silently into the music room after school Schuester asks if you have everything ready for your performance and you tell him that you do and ask if it’s okay if you wait until the end of rehearsal to sing it. He grins at you and says that of course that’s fine and you thank him and take your seat next to Artie and Tina. After everyone gets settled Schuester goes over some notes he has about the vocals for your Sectionals songs and makes a few small choreography changes. You run through all three numbers twice with Schuester stopping everyone here and there to make suggestions and adjustments before he gives you a questioning look and you nod and move toward the front of the room to stand beside him. He puts a hand on your shoulder and you give him a small smile before hanging your head to stare at the floor. You hear him ask the rest of the club to take a seat again and tell them you’ve been working on something that you’d like to share with everyone. Most of you couldn’t care less what the majority of these people think about you but there’s still that small part of you that’s a little terrified you’ll screw the whole thing up or that they’ll think the song is stupid or that you sang it horribly. You look up and feel somewhat relieved that Matt is sitting right beside Rachel and that they’re both over to the right of the group with the piano angled almost directly at them. You know you won’t be able to help at least glancing her way once or twice and at least now there’s the chance that if anyone even notices you looking they’ll just assume you’re looking at Matt for support or something. When you make eye contact Rachel Berry breaks character for the first time in days and grins at you, just barely nodding her head toward the piano before giving you a genuine smile. You turn your head back toward the ground for a moment and smile to yourself before taking a deep breath and addressing everyone.  
  
“Mr. Schuester thought it might help me kinda . . . . deal with my emotions or whatever if I worked on a song over the weekend. Well I couldn’t really find one to _express myself_ necessarily,” you explain, covering your tracks. You’d decided it would be better if they all thought the song didn’t mean anything or else by the end of tomorrow the entire school would think you were in love with Matt or Artie or something equally ridiculous. “So I just chose a song that I really liked.” You finish your little speech and move to the piano bench and take a seat. You glance up at Rachel as you start playing the intro to Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls and you can tell the exact moment she recognizes the song because the easy smile on her face is almost instantly replaced by shock. You look back down and watch your fingers ghost across the piano keys, releasing a short hollow laugh under your breath. You should’ve known that out of the fifteen hundred songs on that damn iPod you’d pick the _one_ song that she has some sort of connection to. You push the irritation to the back of your mind and try to concentrate as you start singing the first verse.  
  
 _And I’d give up forever to touch you  
‘Cause I know that you feel me somehow  
You’re the closest to heaven that I’ll ever be  
And I don’t wanna go home right now  
And all I can taste is this moment  
And all I can breathe is your life  
And sooner or later it’s over  
I just don’t wanna miss you tonight_  
  
You look up at her again as you sing the last line and her expression is blank now but her eyes are full of grief and heartache. She holds your gaze for just a second before closing her eyes and turning her head.  
  
 _And I don’t want the world to see me  
‘Cause I don’t think that they’d understand  
When everything’s made to be broken  
I just want you to know who I am_  
  
As you start playing the second verse you quickly scan the room, mostly to keep yourself from looking at Rachel again, and Schuester catches your eye. He gives you a proud smile and an encouraging nod and you smile back at him almost shyly before dropping your gaze back to the keys.  
  
 _And you can’t fight the tears that ain’t coming  
Or the moment of truth in your lies  
When everything feels like the movies_  
  
Your eyes drift back toward Rachel as you sing the third line and you notice that she looks small again. She’s staring down at the hands in her lap and you think she might be shaking a little but you’re too far away to be sure. She suddenly looks up at you right as you start the last line and you think you see tears starting to well up in her eyes.  
  
 _Yeah you bleed just to know you’re alive_  
  
Your breath hitches just slightly and this time it’s you who breaks the eye contact, before you do something stupid like allow your voice to crack or give freedom to your own tears that you can feel suddenly threatening at the back of your eyes. You concentrate on the song, on your fingers and your voice, and try to push her out of your mind.  
  
 _And I don’t want the world to see me  
‘Cause I don’t think that they’d understand  
When everything’s made to be broken  
I just want you to know who I am_  
  
You skip the first minute of the instrumental break and go straight to the slow part at the end. You risk one last glance at Rachel but she’s gone back to looking down at her lap. Your eyes drift over toward Matt and he’s just staring at you looking very confused. After a second he turns his head to the right to stare at Rachel. Another second or two and he’s looking back at you with something almost like understanding. You just stare back at him, praying that the panic you’re starting to feel isn’t written all over your face, before you finally force yourself to break his gaze and look back down at the piano. Again you concentrate on the song and the notes, trying to forget everything else.  
  
 _And I don’t want the world to see me  
‘Cause I don’t think that they’d understand  
When everything’s made to be broken  
I just want you to know who I am  
I just want you to know who I am  
I just want you to know who I am_  
  
You finish the song and stand up to a smattering of mostly genuine applause, a short ‘whoop’ from Tina, and a few whistles from Artie. You give the two of them an embarrassed smile and thank everyone and head back to your seat. Schuester moves to the front of the room and applauds your performance one more time before going over his notes again and reminding people of the changes he made today and the areas they need to work on. You barely even hear him though, your mind too busy trying to figure out what the hell you’re going to tell Matt when he asks. Schuester dismisses everyone and of course Rachel immediately jumps up and heads for the door. You stand up as soon as she does with an almost instinctual need to go after her even though you know it isn’t an option this time as you can already see Matt striding across the room toward you purposefully out of the corner of your eye.  
  
“What the _hell_ was that?!” he says in a harsh whisper gesturing toward the piano.  
  
“Um, the Goo Goo Dolls?”  
  
“Don’t play stupid Quinn, you know what I’m talking about. What the fuck is going on with the two of you? Is that why you’ve been so distant and _miserable_ the last two weeks?” You stare up at him for a few moments knowing that he’s not going to let this go without some sort of explanation. You sigh and grab his arm pulling him over to the side of the room and away from everyone else.  
  
“Can you calm down a little bit please?” He huffs and slowly looks around the room before dragging a hand down his face and relaxing a little.  
  
“Yeah, okay. Sorry.”  
  
“It’s okay.” You sigh again and lean back against the window next to Schuester’s office door, resting your head on the glass behind you and staring up at the ceiling. You take a few seconds to try and clear your head before you speak. “Look, I can’t . . . . . I can’t tell you about it, okay.” You hear him scoff under his breath almost before you even finish your sentence.  
  
“Can’t or _won’t_?”  
  
“Can’t,” you answer, leveling your head to look at him with a helpless shrug. He can tell that this isn’t just you being distant and evasive like usual and he considers you for a few moments before finally seeming to let go of his anger.  
  
“Why not?”  
  
“Because it . . .” you trail off and drop your gaze to the ground trying to come up with some way to explain it to him without having to actually explain it at all. You look back up at him shoving your hands into the pockets of your jeans and shrugging again. “Because it isn’t my story to tell,” is what you finally decide on because really it’s the truth. Despite how overwhelmed and lost you’ve felt the last two weeks, you’re really not much more than a benchwarmer in this whole thing. Rachel would probably say ‘understudy’ was a more fitting term. Even if you really wanted to tell Matt it just doesn’t feel like your place to do it. He sighs and gives you an understanding nod.  
  
“Yeah, okay. I get that.” You stand in silence for a few seconds, neither of you really looking at each other, before he takes a deep breath and speaks again. “Just promise me that it isn’t something crazy, okay. That she’s not like, in trouble or anything.” There’s true concern in his eyes and his voice and you can’t help but smile a little as you’re reminded that underneath the cool casual attitude and the football popularity Matt is a _genuinely good guy_ and a pretty damn decent friend. You find some small comfort in the fact that at least your friendship with him is one positive thing that’s come out of all this.  
  
“No, it’s nothing like that,” you reassure him. “It’s just, ya know, teenage drama type stuff. I promise.”   
  
“Good.” He takes another deep breath looking relieved and your smile returns. “What?” he asks slowly with a cautious look after a few seconds of you just grinning at him and saying nothing. You raise your eyebrows at the question and slowly shake your head.  
  
“Nothing, just,” you stare up at him for a moment and he gives you a small nervous grin, “you’re a really good guy Matt.” His grin morphs into an almost embarrassed smile and he laughs.  
  
“Yeah, well . . .” he trails off with a shrug. You push yourself off of the wall behind you and take a step toward him.  
  
“I’m sorry I’ve been such a shitty friend lately. No more, I promise,” you say sincerely but he just shakes his head and waves a hand at you halfheartedly.  
  
“Don’t worry about it. You’ve got . . . a lot of stuff going on.” You both laugh quietly as the last bit of tension finally fades from the two of you.  
  
“Yeah, you’re not wrong.” He just grins and laughs again.  
  
“So, you uh, you ready to go?”  
  
“Actually I was thinking I might walk. Ya know, wander around for a while, try and clear my head.”  
  
“That’s cool. You’re . . . okay though, right? You’re good?” You smile at him again and nod.  
  
“Yeah, I’m good.”   
  
“Good. See you tomorrow morning?” he asks with a smile as he starts backing away from you toward the door.  
  
“Yeah, see you tomorrow.” He gives you a small wave and then turns and walks out into the hall. When you look away from the door to glance around the room you realize it’s completely empty now apart from you and Mr. Schuester who is walking your way and flipping through a stack of sheet music. He stops just in front of his office door and smiles at you.  
  
“You did really good today, Quinn.” You smile back feeling a little embarrassed and duck your head for just a second.  
  
“Thanks Mr. Schue.”  
  
“I’ll admit I was a little surprised by the song choice,” he says with a laugh, “but still, overall it was pretty impressive.” He steps past you into his office and starts sorting the sheet music out into smaller piles on top of his desk. You take a few slow backward steps toward the exit and open your mouth to thank him again and say good-bye but he starts talking again before you get the chance. “I think everyone else thought so too,” he says, his attention still on the papers in front of him, and then laughs lightly to himself “I mean even Rachel didn’t seem to have any complaints about it.” You freeze for just a second as the name hits you. For a moment you’d almost forgotten about the whole thing, too caught up in the familiar easiness with Matt to remember what had started the conversation in the first place. You laugh absentmindedly at his joke and murmur your agreement. For nearly a minute you just stand there, staring off to the side at nothing in particular, until finally you make a decision. You step back toward the office and lean halfway into it against the doorframe.  
  
“Mr. Schue?” He glances over at you and raises his eyebrows questioningly. “You wouldn’t happen to have a phonebook in here by any chance would you?”  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
It turns out there are three ‘Berry’s in Lima but only one with two male names listed and the address isn’t even that far from the high school. Hours spent wandering around this town over the last month has left you with a pretty good knowledge of most all of the streets and how they’re connected so it only takes you about half an hour to get there. As you start walking up her driveway you still have no idea what you’re going to say to her or how you’ll even explain why you’re here exactly when she asks. You just know that you need to see her. In the music room when Schuester said her name all the pain and heartache had immediately tried to come flooding back but some part of you refused to let it. That same part then started arguing that after two weeks of your heart breaking every single day and trying desperately to find a solution that just wasn’t there it was time to cut your losses and let her go. It’s the last thing you want to do but you just can’t see any other options. There’s just no way that ‘Rachel and Quinn’ works now, and spending every day wishing and pleading for something that simply doesn’t exist is just pointless self-inflicted torture. You’re not naïve enough to think that just because you decide to let Rachel go today that tomorrow will be all sunshine and roses, you know the wanting and the heartache will still be there just as strong, but you just can’t keep going like this. You’ve got to at least try to accept that you can’t have her and move on before the weight of all this pulls you completely under and so far down that you can’t ever resurface. You think that’s probably the reason you’ll give when she asks you why the hell you’re here, that you’ve decided to wash your hands of all of it the best you can and thought that you should at least let her know, even though you know it’s a lie and you’re pretty sure she’ll know it too. The real reason you’re standing here at Rachel Berry’s front door is that you need to see her one last time as Rachel and Quinn. You didn’t know that day in the clearing would be the only time until it was already over and maybe if you’d known you would’ve done things differently, asked different questions or paid more attention to everything or maybe just appreciated the whole thing more than you did. So now that you’re giving up you need that one last time where you both _know_ it’s the last time, for closure or your sanity or something else you’re not sure. You just know that you _need_ it if you’re going to have any hope of actually letting her go.  
  
You take a deep calming breath and knock on the door, praying that she won’t just tell you to fuck off and slam the door back in your face. The next thing you know the door swings halfway open and you’re being yanked through it and getting yelled at. It takes you a second or two to get your bearings and figure out what the hell is happening before you can finally concentrate on what it is she’s yelling.  
  
“What the _hell_ are you doing coming here?!”  
  
“I . . .I wanted to see you,” you answer a little nervously but she doesn’t even seem to hear you.  
  
“Just waltzing up to my _front door_ in the middle of the fucking afternoon! What if one of your mother’s goddamn DAR ladies lives across the street and recognized you?! Hell, what if my fucking _dads_ were home, Quinn?!”  
  
“Then you probably wouldn’t be yelling and cursing at me as much?” you say uncertainly just trying to calm her down some and stop the yelling. She scoffs at you rolling her eyes and shaking her head. She looks down and closes her eyes, slowly running a hand through her hair before letting it rest on the back of her neck while she takes a few slow deep breaths. You just stand still and watch her silently not wanting to say the wrong thing and start her yelling again. After nearly a minute that feels like years she opens her eyes and looks over at you with that same tired expression and your heart twists a little at the thought that misery or exhaustion seem to be the only things you’re capable of causing her to feel nowadays. You stare at each other for a few seconds before she shakes her head again with a sigh and turns to walk up the stairs behind her. She gets almost to the top of them before you realize you should probably be going after her.   
  
You go up the stairs and follow her down the hall to her room. She waits for you to come in before closing the door behind you and walking over to her dresser, opening the top drawer and digging around for a second before finding what she’s looking for and going to the window across the room. She slides the glass up with one hand while the other sets whatever she got from the dresser down on the windowsill beside her. You stare at it for a second before you realize what it is and your eyes widen in shock. You turn your attention back to her as she pops the screen out of her window and pulls it back into the room to lean it against the wall. You slowly move from your position in front of the door across the room to stand a few feet to her right as she picks the gold and white cigarette pack back up from the sill, taking one out and putting it between her lips. You stick your hands in your pockets and lean your right shoulder against the wall, watching silently as she puts the pack down and picks up a lighter. She lights the cigarette and inhales deeply from it, leaning forward to rest her elbows on the sill and letting her eyes close as she slowly blows the smoke out the window. Of all the seemingly insane things that Rachel has done and told you over the last few weeks the fact that she’s standing in front of you smoking – and looking _completely natural_ while she does it – for some reason shocks you more than anything else. You can’t help but grin a little and shake your head at this tiny enigma of a girl in front of you.  
  
“You smoke?” you ask simply, finally breaking the silence.  
  
“When the occasion calls for it.” She takes another hit and keeps staring out the window. You both settle back into silence for a minute until another question occurs to you.  
  
“Do I smoke?” She laughs lightly and turns to look at you, raising her eyebrows and nodding her head to the side before looking back out the window.  
  
“When the occasion calls for it,” she says again with a smirk, stretching her arm out the window and flicking the ashes off her cigarette. You grin and take a moment to add that to the list of random facts in your head about Quinn Fabray before speaking again.  
  
“So which one of us started it?”  
  
“You did, about a year ago. One night after we had some little fight that pissed both of us off you lit a cigarette and I just took it out of your mouth and smoked it.” She smiles at the memory and just like always it causes a smile of your own.  
  
“Why’d I start?”  
  
“To piss off your parents of course,” she glances over at you and laughs before taking another hit, “same with the cursing.”  
  
“Oh. I’d been wondering where I got that from.”  
  
“You told me once back in the beginning that every time you cursed was like a little personalized ‘fuck you’ to your parents.” You both chuckle and you straighten up off the wall.  
  
“Well that explains _me_ , but why is _your_ vocabulary so filthy?” you ask taking a couple of steps toward her, stopping just at the edge of the window and leaning on the wall again. She takes another hit and grins up at you blowing smoke out the side of her mouth.  
  
“Bad fuckin’ influences I suppose.” She smirks again and turns back to the window flicking her ashes again. You laugh quietly and you both settle back into silence for a minute or two, Rachel staring out at nothing and you staring at her. The pink shorts and white tank top she’s wearing make her look young and almost innocent and the way her hair, still just a little wet from her shower, falls down around her face makes you almost desperate to reach out and touch her. You watch as the easiness slowly leaves her and a serious look starts to make it’s way across her face, wishing you knew how to stop it because you know what that look means. The banter and smiles are over and it’s time for heartache or screaming or both. “You shouldn’t have come here, you know,” she says, still looking out the window, her voice quiet and calm.  
  
“I know,” you answer her, your voice matching her own.  
  
“It was stupid.”  
  
“I know.” She sighs and takes one last hit before stretching her arm out and rolling the cigarette back and forth between her thumb and forefinger until the fire drops out of it and onto the grass below. She stands up and pops the screen back into place then closes the window and walks across the room to her bathroom. You hear the toilet flush a second later and she comes back over to the window, picking up the cigarettes and the lighter and putting them back in her dresser. She closes the drawer and grabs a bottle from on top of the dresser and sprays herself, the room, and you after a moment of consideration. You jump a little when she sprays you and after a second you recognize the smell as the same one from the clearing two weeks ago. You look down at your gray T-shirt with the simple black Nike logo in the middle and think it’s a shame that now you’ll never be able to wear it again because it’s kind of soft and comfortable. You know that even if you wash it five or ten times your brain will still think that her scent is on it and you’ll be able to smell it. There have been days these last two weeks when you were sitting in Spanish or Glee and you were absolutely convinced that you could somehow smell that same scent even though she was twenty feet away from you. And there have been nights you laid in bed with tears streaming down your face, feeling almost suffocated by the smell of her.  
  
“So why are you here?” The question pulls you from your thoughts and you look up from your shirt to see her standing in the middle of the room, arms crossed over her chest and looking tired again. It occurs to you that it’s insanely unhealthy for a seventeen year old to look so exhausted and defeated as often as she does and you feel a painful tightening in your chest knowing that you’re the reason for it.  
  
“I . . . . wanted to talk.”  
  
“Yeah, I figured that much. What about?” You open your mouth to say something about stopping all of this and moving on, about letting each other go, but something just won’t let you say it and after a few seconds your jaw slowly closes as you hang your head and stare at the windowsill in front of you.  
  
“You wanna tell me what happened in Glee earlier?” you finally say as you look back up at her. Most of you doesn’t even care what it was, knowing that whatever explanation she gives you will just be jagged pieces of a life you can’t have that you’ll grip onto desperately until they tear your flesh and spill your blood. But that constant nagging need for information in the back of your mind demands to know.   
  
“No,” she says simply and just keeps staring at you.  
  
“What do you mean ‘no’? Why not?” She sighs and shakes her head, shrugging and looking around the room as if she can find the words she’s searching for on the ceiling or the walls.  
  
“Because it doesn’t matter.” She moves to the foot of the bed and sinks down onto it, uncrossing her arms and bracing herself with a hand at the edge of the mattress on either side of her. You push yourself off the wall again, keeping your hands firmly dug into your pockets as you take two steps toward her.  
  
“It matters to me, Rachel.” She sighs again after a moment and stares in front of her at the carpet across the room.  
  
“Look, it was nothing okay. Just a song you used to listen to when you were feeling especially depressed and emo about everything and it just caught me off guard is all.” Over the last month you’ve gotten in the habit of just interrupting people with a ‘what’s that mean?’ when you hear a word you don’t know – a habit that you admit is a bit rude but if you don’t ask immediately you usually forget to and then when you remember the word later it drives you crazy until you can get home and look it up – and the question is nearly out of your mouth at the word ‘emo’ before you realize it’s not really important and you can pretty much figure out the definition from the context anyway. You have the urge to dig deeper, knowing that what you saw earlier was more than just her being surprised by a song she didn’t expect to hear, but you don’t want a fight so you decide not to push for once.  
  
“And last Wednesday, what happened there?” She turns her head back toward you looking confused and her eyes dart around while she tries to remember. She takes a deep breath and raises her eyebrows as understanding finally washes over her.  
  
“Right,” she says slowly looking somewhere off to the side of you before rolling her eyes just a little and scoffing lightly under her breath. “The quarter thing.”  
  
“Oh, no,” you correct her quickly, the fingers of your right hand automatically gripping at the quarter that somehow always manages to be in your pocket, “I mean, yeah that too, but I meant what happened in Glee that afternoon actually.” She glances back over to you and her face twitches up in a little half grin for just a second before she turns her attention back to the carpet in front of her.  
  
“What happened in Glee was _because_ of the quarter thing.” You feel your eyebrows scrunch together curiously as you take another step toward her. “One day, toward the beginning of last year in Geometry, you noticed that I was particularly horny,” the word shocks you just a little and you blink in surprise for a second before remembering that Rachel is usually blunt about things that most others aren’t and you just shake your head with a grin, “and thought you’d torture me a little by doing that quarter trick and reminding me just how skilled your fingers were.” Your eyes widen some and an embarrassed laugh escapes you before you can stop it. “It was actually more cheesy and adorable than flirty and teasing,” she looks over at you with a quick grin before settling her gaze back in front of her. “But ever since that day whenever _you_ were feeling horny you’d dig a quarter out of your purse and walk it across your knuckles, like some sort of secret signal to me. Sometimes you wouldn’t even realize you were doing it but it always meant the same thing. So, ironically enough, whenever I would see you do it, knowing what it meant and the things you were thinking about, it would,” she glances at you again for just a second and raises her eyebrows, “have the effect you were trying for that first time.” You suddenly notice that you’re a lot closer to her now, maybe only a foot to her left, and figure you must’ve moved toward her again while she was talking without even realizing it. “So when I looked over last week and saw you staring off at nothing and walking that quarter over your knuckles again and again . . .” she turns her head toward you and stares up into your eyes and you watch as her tongue quickly darts out to run across her top lip. You look back up at her eyes and wonder if they’ve always been this dark a shade of brown and notice that the two of you are breathing a bit more deeply than you were just a minute ago. Your hand suddenly releases its death grip on the coin in your pocket and is slowly inching toward her before you finally snap yourself out of the trance the two of you are caught in. You quickly take in a deep breath and your eyes pull away from hers to your hand as you clench it into a tight fist and pull it up toward your chest. You feel yourself start to panic and your eyes dart frantically around the room for a moment before landing back on her.  
  
“I can’t do this,” you breathe out, barely looking at her before spinning around and moving back to the window. You close your eyes and run your hands through your hair, trying to get your breathing to even out and the shaking to stop. It’s all too much, standing here in her room talking about this with the smell and sound and sight of her crashing into you from all directions. Your lungs feel like they’re being squeezed shut and your skin is prickling almost painfully. You’re suddenly _desperate_ for a fucking drink and you briefly consider running downstairs and tearing the entire house apart until you find something even resembling alcohol. You hear her get up off the bed behind you and take just a few steps in your direction. You wonder if maybe a cigarette would help since drinking isn’t _actually_ an option and you’re just about to move to her dresser to get one when you hear her voice, quiet and calm again, coming from off to the right somewhere behind you.  
  
“Can’t do what, Quinn?” You glance over to the left at her dresser again before ultimately deciding against the cigarette and shifting your gaze to the tree line outside her window, taking a few more deep breaths. As the two of you stand there silently you feel the panic slowly fade away only to be replaced with the same exhaustion you’ve seen in her so many times.  
  
“This. Any of it.” You sigh and close your eyes, finally remembering the reason you came here in the first place. You don’t know what you thought would happen, that maybe you’d joke and laugh and cuddle before shaking hands politely and declaring that you’d both go your separate ways, – you shake your head at yourself for letting the daydreams get in and poison your rational thinking – you just knew that you couldn’t do this anymore and you had to stop it. “It might be easy for you, you’re,” you open your eyes and sigh again, “used to it or whatever, but . . . . . it’s killing me, Rachel.”  
  
“You think this is _easy_ for me?” she asks after a moment and you can hear the anger creeping into her voice. Shit.  
  
“Not _easy_ ,” you backtrack, spinning around to face her, “I just meant that . . .”  
  
“You have _no idea_ what it’s like for me, Quinn,” she interrupts before you can even figure out what to say. Her voice is still calm and mostly quiet but the anger is there, like the steady bass beat of a slow intro warning you that the music is about to explode. “You think _you’re_ in pain? _I’m_ the one that remembers, you don’t even know what you’re missing. All you have is the vague idea of _us_ and _happiness_ , but I know _exactly_ what we lost.” The anger tightens her jaw and curls her lip but it’s pain and grief you see in her eyes. “And I tried to forget,” she closes her eyes as the pain slowly spreads to the rest of her features, “you have no idea how hard I tried.” She opens her eyes and looks at you helplessly, shrugging and shaking her head. “But I couldn’t. And you keep doing these things that you don’t even _remember_.” She raises her hands in frustration while an incredulous laugh escapes under her breath. “Like the ‘you just be Rachel’ thing in the bathroom weeks ago, or the song today, or the _fucking quarter_!” She laughs again and brings her right hand up across her eyes, squeezing at her temples with her thumb and middle finger while her other hand comes up to rest on her hip. You see her take a deep breath before dragging her hand down her face and looking at you again, the slight insanity of a moment ago now replaced with exhaustion and just a hint of the pain from before. Her emotions are more chaotic and unpredictable than usual and that little voice in the back of your mind whispers something that sends a chill through you and makes your stomach drop. Rachel is breaking. “You keep walking around looking and sounding like _my_ Quinn and it’s like I just have this . . . . Pavlovian response to you.”   
  
“Path-what?” you ask before you can stop yourself. She looks at you for a second before rolling her eyes at herself and nodding.  
  
“Right. Okay, uh, in the late 1800s there was this Russian physiologist named Pavlov who had this dog,” the pain and exhaustion fade just a little as she focuses on the story and for once you’re thankful for your sometimes shitty impulse control, “and every time he fed it he would ring a bell first. After a few weeks whenever he would ring the bell the dog would instantly start to salivate, just hearing that sound automatically made it hungry.” She stops talking for a few moments and looks off to the side closing her eyes and sighing again. After what feels like hours she finally opens her eyes again and the pain that was there before has evolved into anguish. “Ever since you woke up,” you unthinkingly take a step closer to her, “all you’ve done is ring that fucking bell. And I am _starving_ here, Quinn.” Her voice just barely breaks toward the end and you take two more steps.  
  
“Rachel, I-”  
  
“No.” She holds up a hand to stop you, from getting closer or speaking you’re not sure, maybe both. “Just don’t,” she asks quietly and you hold up your hands in surrender with a small nod.  
  
“Okay.”  
  
“I know you’re hurting, Quinn. I know you feel lost and helpless, like you’re drowning and I’m the only thing you can see for miles.” You almost smile at that, realizing she knows you so well she even knows what metaphors you use in your head, before you think better of it. “But I can’t help you. I’m _barely_ keeping myself afloat here.” And there’s your cue.  
  
“So let’s stop.”  
  
“Stop what?”  
  
“Stop doing this to ourselves.” She briefly holds your gaze before shaking her head and moving past you to the window just a few feet behind you and you twist around, letting your eyes follow her the whole way. “Look, if we can’t have each other then we have to move on. We _have_ to let go, Rachel.”  
  
“I can’t.” She reaches both hands forward to lean against the windowsill. “But it’s okay if you do. You probably should.” You move back toward the window, stopping maybe a foot to her right, your positions an almost hollow echo of ten minutes ago.  
  
“Why can’t you, Rachel?” She stares out the window for a moment before she answers you.  
  
“You’re a lot closer to the shore now than I am, Quinn.” You feel the corner of your mouth twitch up into a small grin, knowing it’s the dramatic performer in her that causes her to take the metaphor and run with it. “I’m too far in to even begin to remember how to get out,” she says simply, still not looking at you. “But you still can.” You figured this was the response you’d get when you told her, save yourself and leave me behind, but you’ve already abandoned her once and the thought of doing it again rips your heart in two and brings tears to your eyes.  
  
“No one can tread water forever, Rach. You’ll drown.”  
  
“I don’t have to do it forever.” Her voice is quieter than before and her eyes are distant, like she’s not even really talking to you anymore. “Just long enough for you to come back and save me.” Your breath catches in your throat and suddenly a ridiculous image flashes across your mind of Rachel floating on her back in the middle of the ocean as you pull up beside her on a boat labeled ‘Memories’ in a white captain’s uniform and pull her onboard. You slam your eyes shut to block it out and a tear slips down your cheek. “Every time I made a mistake before you always fixed it,” your eyes snap open as you hear her voice again, barely more than a whisper, “you’ll fix this one too.” You stare at her for a few moments, blinking the tears from your eyes and trying to figure out what the hell she’s talking about, before you finally just ask.  
  
“What mistake, Rachel?” She jumps a little at your voice and glances up at you with a hint of panic in her eyes. Whatever it is she’s talking about you’re pretty sure she didn’t mean to talk about it in front of you. She moves her eyes back to the window and leans against the sill a little more.  
  
“I . . . .” she trails off hanging her head and closing her eyes and takes a few deep breaths before starting again. “I did this to us.” She slowly opens her eyes and raises her head, tensing her arms and shoulders and staring out at the tree line again. The blank expression on her face scares you a little and your skin tingles with the need to reach out and touch her. You slowly reach toward her and gently lay your left hand on the small of her back and feel the slightest wave of relief when she relaxes just a little at the touch.  
  
“What are you talking about?” you ask her quietly and wait patiently for her answer.  
  
“The day you had your accident,” she finally says, her voice calm and even again, “we had a Glee meeting before school and I snapped at Mr. Schuester, just started yelling at him for no reason. It went on for nearly a minute before I realized what I was doing and I apologized and just left. Everyone else probably just chalked it up to Rachel Berry being Rachel Berry but you knew better. It’d been ten days since we’d seen each other and it was getting to me a lot more than it usually did. Sylvester was cracking the whip with extra practices, the celibacy club was trying to organize a fundraiser, and your mother was throwing some event that she kept insisting you help her with. There just wasn’t any time.” Her face is still blank and her eyes are distant again and you start slowly dragging your thumb back and forth on her back. “When you texted me after third period that we should meet that night I knew it was a bad idea. I could see how exhausted you’d been all week and I knew you were only suggesting a meet because you thought I needed it. I spent the entire time in fourth period trying to convince myself to borrow someone’s phone and tell you no, but I just couldn’t make myself do it.” She finally looks over at you and you can see the tears building up behind her eyes as she stares into yours. “I just wanted to see you,” she says with a sad smile and a broken voice and then turns to face the window again as a tear rolls down her face. Your vision is suddenly blurred with tears of your own, rushing up to meet hers like always, and you close your eyes against the twisting pain in your heart forcing the tears to break free. You step toward her, resting your forehead against the side of her head and bringing your right hand up to lie on top of hers.  
  
“It’s not your fault, Rach,” you whisper and the force of your tears doubles as you realize that _this_ is the thing that’s been tearing her apart for the last month and a half. That on top of everything else she’s convinced herself that she’s to blame for all of it, that it’s her fault you’ve forgotten her.  
  
“It is,” she argues with a shaky voice and you open your eyes to see the tears streaming down her face, “I knew. I knew you were to-too tired but I didn’t stop it and you, you fell asleep in the car and n-now –”  
  
“No baby,” the word slips out before you even know you’re going to say it and you feel her shudder as a sob rips through her. You slide your hand around her back to her hip and pull her into you as your other hand moves up to her wrist, both of them gripping onto her tightly. “It isn’t your fault,” you tell her again and lift your head just enough to place a soft kiss on her temple not thinking anymore, just acting, “I promise. It’s not your fault.” She suddenly twists toward you, wrapping her arms around your waist and burying her face into your chest. You tighten the arm around her back and bring your right hand up to the back of her neck as you place another kiss on the top of her head and watch your tears fall into her hair.  
  
“Fuck, I miss you all the time.” Her hands dig into you and you close your eyes again as your tears get impossibly stronger. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” she mumbles into your chest over and over again. As you stand there holding her while she cries for the second time in as many weeks, shushing her and telling her again and again that none of this is her fault, you know what you have to do. As much as letting go of her is going to hurt you know it’s the only option you have. You’d give anything to not have to abandon her again but this new Quinn can only bring her pain and heartache. Walking away is the lesser of two evils. You stay with her until both of your tears have finally slowed and she tells you that you should probably leave before her dad gets home. She says a ten-minute walk through the woods behind her house will bring you to Hampton Street, which is just a few streets over from the Fabrays. As you reach the tree line in her backyard you stop and look back up at her window, sighing and reminding yourself that this is the only way. You allow yourself just a few moments before you turn to walk away from her and into the woods, swimming for the shore and praying that a miracle is waiting there for you.


	10. Chapter 10

**TUESDAY**

  
  
You’re exhausted, hung over, and completely fucking numb. Every step you took through the woods yesterday felt like a little piece of your heart tearing away and by the time you got to the Fabrays there was only a small sliver of it left, tattered and bruised. You spent the entire night drinking glass after glass and screaming in your head that the whole thing was ridiculous and you were pathetic for letting it break you. Rachel was right; you don’t remember any of it, you don’t know her – not like she knows you –, and you have no idea what it even is to actually be with her. Even now when you think about what she’s gone through over the last month and a half versus what you’ve gone through you feel weak and useless and, for the first time, like a true Fabray.   
  
You have no idea where you go from here. Since the day you woke up your life has revolved around Rachel in one way or another. You think about living a life completely devoid of her and it just doesn’t make sense, like someone telling you over and over that starting tomorrow the color green simply won’t exist. You don’t know how to accept something so ludicrous as fact. It feels like she’s always been there, strong and constant, and the thought of her not being there anymore feels like losing a limb. You laugh now when you think of how lost you felt before. You didn’t even know the meaning of the word.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
Rachel isn’t Rachel anymore, there’s only Rachel Berry now. Outwardly she’s the same, babbling and lecturing with her shoulders back and her chin held high. But those tiny hints of the real her – the almost melodic quality in her voice when she speaks, the sparkle in her eyes, that deep tone that runs through her laugh like a train – are gone and only her alter ego is left. It’s the eyes that you notice first. You saw it in them the second you walked into Spanish this morning and after a few minutes you left for the bathroom where you could cry in peace. But the tears never came. You felt cold and powerless and _guilty_ but the numbness overwhelmed all of it. By the time you went back to class half an hour later the headache you’d woken up with had doubled and you welcomed the pain with widespread arms.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
All day long people talk at you, some not caring if you’re even listening and some waiting eagerly for a response that will never come. Everything around you keeps fading into a dull buzzing hum and you can’t make yourself hear their words. The only voice you hear is Rachel’s. It’s with you constantly, coming from everywhere and nowhere, rattling around in your mind and creeping along the edges of your skull. Sometimes she begs you to stay, sometimes she screams at you to never come back, and sometimes she just whispers over and over, asking why you did this to her. She told you once that you were an excellent mimic and that you were particularly good with voices and she wasn’t lying. You wish like hell that she had been.  
  
At lunch you sit at your usual table toward the back of the room with Matt on one side of you and Tina on the other. They know you well enough by now to know that the look on your face means talking to you is pointless so they leave you in peace and carry on conversations around you instead. Your eyes find her the instant she enters the room and you watch as she slowly walks across it and goes through the line. She gets her food and less than ten seconds later some idiot in a letterman’s jacket slaps the tray out of her hands and onto the floor. She doesn’t even flinch, just keeps walking to an empty table and takes a seat. You just barely make it to the bathroom before you throw up. The act of it increases the pain in your head and again you’re grateful for it.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
You go to Glee practice after school out of habit more than anything else. On the way there Matt asks if you’ll be needing a ride home, having learned that on days when you’re trapped in your own head you usually prefer to walk, and you shake your head and tell him not today. You can see the concern in his eyes but you know he’ll let it go for today. You also know that if you can’t get better control of yourself and start acting more normal by tomorrow that he won’t let it go again and the questions will come. As you step into the music room you almost instantly feel like you _should_ regret coming here today, but you just don’t. You’ve felt the same prickling numbness all day no matter what was happening around you so you suppose that this is just as good a place to be as anywhere else. Maybe you’ll even get lucky and the singing will drown out Mimic Rachel’s constant pleas and screams.  
  
Again Schuester goes over his notes and takes a few suggestions from the rest of the club before you rehearse. And just like yesterday you run through all three songs twice. Rachel and Finn are singing the ballad, which you’ve come to learn is pretty much just how things work in this group, and as you watch them you almost laugh at the fact that Mimic Rachel talks over every one of Finn’s lines but doesn’t interrupt a single note from The Real Rachel. You’re not sure if it’s because part of you just wants to hear her sing, wants to let yourself be saturated by the familiar torture of it, or because the Rachel you’ve created in your mind is just _that_ in character. You really don’t think it matters either way. The choreography for the other two songs brings you and Rachel mere inches from each other twelve times, twenty-four for the entire rehearsal. Each time she gets close you get that same feeling of being suffocated by the smell of her but every time she passes by you only inhale deeper. It’s not until Schuester dismisses everyone and you’re making your way down the hall that you notice your headache has gotten even worse. You figure that all the music and movement must’ve aggravated it and now it’s beginning to feel like tiny razor blades slowly making their way across your skull. As you open the front doors of William McKinley High School and step outside into the light of the afternoon sun the razors seem to multiply by a dozen and grow larger in size and speed up their path through your brain all at once. Even Mimic Rachel seems to notice the sudden increase of it and gives you just a minute’s peace. You stop on the front steps, closing your eyes and tilting your head up toward the sky. You take a few moments to concentrate on the pain and hold it close, a smile forming on your lips for the first time all day.  
  
  
  
  


**WEDNESDAY**

  
  
Your eyes snap open as you jolt awake, panic, adrenaline, and an undercurrent of anger still pumping through your veins. You sit up and grimace as you feel the clammy dampness of sweat in your hair and around the collar of your shirt. Already the dream is slipping away and you can only remember fragments of it; you and Rachel on a boat, you lying on grass by the side of a road with the boat wrapped around a nearby tree like a pipe used by a superhero to show off his strength, you in the clearing searching frantically and screaming Rachel’s name while a crowd of faceless people dances around you. You close your eyes against the images and try to shake them from your head even as Mimic Rachel screams that they’re important and maybe if you weren’t so pathetic you could figure out what they mean. You take a few deep breaths and try to block her out while you wait for your heartbeat to slow back down. The clock reads 5:15; nearly an hour before you would usually get up, but you know there’s no point in trying to sleep again. You turn the shower on, adjusting the water until it’s almost scalding, and relax just a little as you step under the spray. You focus on the routine of soaps, shampoos, and razors and the burn of the water as it hits your skin. By the time you step out of the shower the dream and all of its side effects have almost disappeared completely, the slight anger still slowly coursing through you the only proof that it even happened.  
  
You end up thankful for being woken up early because it gives you some extra time to get yourself under control enough to stop worrying Matt. You can still feel the numbness around the edges of every thought but it’s much more subdued than yesterday and you can almost ignore it. As you get into Matt’s car you don’t try to plaster a fake smile on your face because you know he wouldn’t buy it anyway, but you do try your best to not look as miserable as you imagine you did the day before. It’s surprisingly easier than you thought it would be.  
  
“And how is Quinn Fabray this fine morning?” he asks with a smile as you close the door and reach for your seatbelt.  
  
“Better,” you answer simply, not realizing until you’ve already said it that it’s actually true. He gets an understanding look on his face and nods slowly.  
  
“Right. About that . . . . did you wanna, I don’t know, talk about it maybe?” His voice is cautious and unsure and he doesn’t look at you as he asks, instead focusing intently on his mirrors as he backs down the driveway. You just stare at him and after a beat he glances at you with a smirk and adds, “Or is it more super secret Rachel stuff?” You stay silent for a moment as Mimic Rachel begs for you to tell him everything, to stop the game and finally put you both out of your misery.  
  
“No. Just a couple of rough nights with the Fabrays.” He nods again and Mimic Rachel asks in a small broken voice why you’d rather keep hurting her than just set her free. Again you take a deep breath and try to block her out. “I’ll be okay. Eventually.” You give him a small smile and he returns it, accepting the excuse and moving on. After that the two of you talk casually about whatever pops into his head and again you find yourself eternally grateful for your friendship with him. Something about him allows you to _almost_ forget everything else and finally feel like Quinn again, if only for a few minutes. You don’t instigate any of the conversation but you respond when it’s called for with actual words instead of just glances and you genuinely laugh at his jokes. Rachel is silent for the rest of the drive.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
Your peace of mind doesn’t last long though. When you walk into Spanish and see her at her desk scribbling away in her notebook it’s like a starting gun for Mimic Rachel. As you walk past her The Real Rachel glances up at you with all but vacant eyes and a blank expression and Mimic Rachel yells in a wounded voice that it’s your fault. That you spent the last two years slowly but surely chipping away at her, causing hundreds of tiny cracks and imperfections, and now she’s on the verge of shattering completely. You tear your eyes away from hers and move toward your seat on unsteady legs, thankful when they get you to your desk without giving out.   
  
For the next hour and a half you don’t hear anything but Rachel, the one in your head only holding her tongue when the real one speaks to Schuester or another student. She screams at you for ever starting this, for promising her you’d be there when part of you knew this could only end with you leaving, for not listening to her back in the beginning when she’d asked you to just stay away from her and ripping away any hope she might’ve still had for a chance at life without you. She begs you to save her and take her away from all of this, to force her into teaching you to be like you were before the accident, to give her just the occasional moment of blissful ignorance instead of abandoning her in a cold and harsh reality that you know she won’t survive. She cries that she doesn’t know how to exist without you anymore, that she loves you and she’s sorry for whatever she did to make you forget that you love her too, that her arms and legs are getting tired and she doesn’t think she can keep her head above water much longer. You listen to every single word, reminding yourself again and again that it’s not Rachel you’re hearing but your own fucked up thoughts and fears being thrown back at you with Rachel’s voice.   
  
When class finally ends you notice that your hands are sitting on top of your desk clenched into tight fists and shaking, the skin of your knuckles almost as white as the bone underneath. As you relax them you start to feel a burning in your palms. You flip them over and see four small marks across the middle of each one. You slowly close your hands again as watch as your nails fold into the marks perfectly, like tiny blades into their sheaths. Schuester clears his throat and your head snaps up to look at him as you quickly pull your hands into your lap and out of view. He grins and says that you should probably get going if you don’t want to be late and points a thumb over his shoulder to the door behind him. You get a flash of yourself springing toward him, your fist moving through the air swiftly and connecting solidly with his jaw. You shake it off and nod as you quickly make your way past him and out the door. Rachel laughs quietly in your ear and the sound of it, bitter and wrong, sends a chill through you.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
The anger has been slowly burning in the background ever since you woke up this morning, steadily building so gradually that you failed to even take notice of it. It wasn’t until halfway through second period, when your fingertips suddenly grazed the coin in your pocket and you had to actively stop yourself from screaming and hurling it at the window across the room, that you realized how strong it had gotten. You spend the rest of class analyzing it; trying to figure out where it’s coming from, what’s causing it to grow, and what exactly it’s directed at. The entire time Mimic Rachel refuses to shut the hell up and let you think which only serves to piss you off even more. You come up with a few guesses and theories but most of them are completely illogical and none of them really _feels_ like the right answer. As the bell rings to dismiss you from class Rachel whispers one last theory; the guilt of completely destroying another human being is causing you to self-destruct and lose your mind. You take a moment to consider the idea as it’s hissed into your ear by a voice in your head. You’re inclined to agree with her.  
  
When you stop by your third period to drop off your English book before going to the cafeteria Karofsky is there, leaning against the wall just inside the door and staring at you. He rakes his eyes down you with a disgusting grin on his face and wiggles his tongue at you. It looks like what you imagine a mentally handicapped frog having a seizure would, and you get the overwhelming urge to kick his balls up into his throat. You settle for a ‘In your fucking dreams, tiny dick’ and give him the finger over your shoulder as you leave the room.   
  
Deciding against actually eating lunch you make a beeline across the cafeteria for your table. You’re halfway there when out of nowhere Noah slides in front of you blocking your way.  
  
“What up, sexy? Ya know, I wasn’t even gonna eat lunch today but you’re lookin’ _damn_ tasty so–”  
  
“Fuck off, Puckerman.” It comes out a little more abrasive than you’d intended but it shuts him up and keeps him from following after you so you don’t really give a shit if his feelings got hurt in the process. ‘Lashing out at innocent bystanders now?’ Mimic Rachel asks as you start across the room again. “Fuck you,” you snap back without really thinking about it and then groan when you realize what you’re doing. “God, I _am_ losing my damn mind.” Rachel whispers her agreement and you try to ignore her as you finally get to the table and drop down onto the bench beside Tina, staring straight ahead and taking a few deep breaths in through your nose.  
  
“You okay?” she asks after a minute.  
  
“Yep, I’m awesome,” you respond quickly without even looking at her.  
  
“You sure? Because you look a little . . . .crazy. And possibly dangerous.” You sigh and relax just a little, closing your eyes for a moment and shaking your head before turning to look at her. You can’t help but laugh a bit at the slightly freaked out look on her face and roll your eyes at yourself.  
  
“I’m okay. Really. I’m just . . . . . pissed off.” Her expression quickly flickers from freaked out to cautious and then questioning. “Parents,” you elaborate with a shrug and she gives you an understanding nod and turns back to her food. Rachel asks how many more times you’re going to lie to your closest friends today with a sickly sweet voice and you immediately tense back up, breathing out a quiet incredulous laugh. “Okay, that’s _it_!” you whisper harshly earning you another freaked out look from Tina. “I’m just gonna,” you trail off, vaguely motioning somewhere behind you, “I’ll be right back.” You quickly stand up and stalk back across the cafeteria toward the exit. You almost run into Matt coming in the doorway as you’re going out it.  
  
“Hey!” he greets you with a smile that quickly vanishes when he sees the look on your face. “Whoa.” He holds up his hands in surrender and sidesteps out of your way. “Carry on.” As you step past him and into the hall Mimic Rachel starts in again.  
  
“ _Now there’s the Quinn Fabray we all know and hate, terrifying people left and right with a single glance._ ” You just keep quiet and start walking a little faster. You finally make it to the second floor bathroom and feel utterly relieved to find it empty. You lock the door behind you and move over to the mirror, bracing your arms on the counter in front of it.  
  
“This is ridiculous,” you tell yourself, staring into the eyes of your reflection. “It’s not real. You are fucking doing this to yourself. So just stop doing it. Just _stop_ it.” You stand completely still for almost a minute, trying to clear your mind and convince yourself that you have the power to stop this. When another minute goes by without her voice echoing in your skull you finally relax and hang your head to stare at the sink. You let out a long sigh of relief and feel the corner of your mouth slowly lift up into a grin.  
  
“ _You feel better now?_ ” Her voice knocks the breath out of you and nearly causes your arms to give out underneath you. Your hands claw at the counter beneath them as the anger takes center stage again. Your breath comes in deep quick bursts and you feel yourself start to shake.  
  
“FUCK!” Your right arm suddenly darts out in front of you and smashes your fist into the glass. It takes you by surprise but as you feel the burning start in your knuckles and look at the single jagged crack that’s now a part of the mirror you feel a slight sense of something almost like euphoria. You stare at your reflection for a moment, now split into two pieces that don’t quite match up like they should, and you can’t help but laugh. The sound of it is a little crazier than you’d like. “What do you want, Rach?” you ask the empty room, staring down at the white of the counter but only seeing Rachel’s face. “To make me feel like shit? To torture me? Because, trust me, I’ve got that covered. So _please_ just shut up and leave me the hell alone.”  
  
“ _I can’t leave you alone, Quinn. This is your punishment. You can’t expect to stand by and watch someone implode and not get hit by the shrapnel. You spent the last two years making sure my entire existence was wrapped up in you, crawling in and infecting every single part of my life like a virus. I’m just returning the favor._ ” You hear yourself laugh again, broken and crazy, and you feel tears pushing up behind your eyes.  
  
“Just shut up,” you plead quietly, running your hands into your hair and gripping tightly at your skull as if you can physically force her out. “Shut up, shut up, shut up.” You whisper it over and over again, like a spell meant to banish her from your mind. The tears pour over your cheeks as you sink to your knees and rest your head on the cool edge of the counter. You mumble for her to be quiet, to stop talking and leave you in peace, again and again but you’re barely even aware of the words tumbling from your mouth. The only concrete thought in your head is that you can’t do this anymore. That there’s nowhere to turn now and no way either of you makes it out of this alive. You stay in the bathroom crumpled on the floor for the rest of lunch and Rachel finally takes pity on you and lets you break down in silence.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
As you slowly make your way down the hall toward English you remember that you didn’t get your notebook before lunch so you stop at your locker to grab it. When you shut your locker door you again find yourself face to face with Dave Karofsky, leaning against the lockers with a smirk. It pisses you off and exhausts you all at once.  
  
“Look Fabray, I get it, the whole playing hard to get thing that you chicks love to do. But don’t you think it’s time to stop fighting it?” He moves around in front of you, trapping you between him and the lockers at your back, and brings his right hand up to rest on the metal just inches from your face. He leans toward you and lowers his voice and you fight the urge to vomit all over him. “We both know you’ve wanted me for years. Skip English with me, the backseat in my Escalade is huge and pretty comfy. I could show you a hell of a good time.”  
  
“Jesus, does that shit ever actually _work_?” you ask with a laugh before you can stop yourself. You’ve overheard better pick up lines fall clumsily from Finn’s mouth than the shit Karofsky is spewing at you. You put both hands on his chest and shove him away from you with a scoff of disgust. “Listen Dave, I’m gonna be _completely_ honest with you here okay, and I want you to _really_ hear me. You and I will _never_ happen. I can’t even _think_ about touching you without feeling like I need to throw up everything I have ever eaten.” He rolls his eyes and reaches a hand out toward your hip but you slap it away forcefully before it even reaches you. “No,” you scold him like a dog eyeing a pair of expensive and chewable shoes, “listen. There is nothing you could ever say or do that would make me want you. _Know_ that if we were the only two people in existence, if you were the only other human I _ever_ met in my _entire_ life, I would die a virgin.” He crosses his arms over his chest and snorts with an offended look. “So _please_ just save your energy and my time and _never fucking speak to me again._ ” He raises his hands up in the air between the two of you and tries to look like he doesn’t really care one way or the other.  
  
“Whatever, you fucking cock tease,” he finally says, leaning down so his face is just a few inches from yours, “I don’t even give a shit. You wanna miss out on this, that’s your fucking call. I was just trying to do you a goddamn favor.” He shrugs and finally steps back away from you, turning slowly and starting down the hall. He takes two or three steps before he mumbles ‘fucking dyke’ just loud enough to make sure you hear it. Instantly your anger evolves to absolute rage and with it comes perfect clarity. You’re pissed off at a society that looks down on anything you might feel for Rachel as wrong and immoral and punishable, at “parents” who will always be more concerned with appearances than the happiness and well-being of their own children, at “friends” who are so wrapped up in their own lives that they don’t even notice a girl crumbling right in front of their eyes, at a medical field that creates miracles every day but doesn’t have the first _clue_ how to restore a girl’s memory, and at a version of yourself you can’t remember because _she’s_ the one who built this whole house of cards on such unstable ground. As you turn your head to look at him, your notebook slipping from your hand forgotten, suddenly David Karofsky feels like the complete embodiment of all of these things at once. He really never stood a chance.  
  
On any other day you’d be no match for him, but today is different. Today you’re furious and it’s the rage that tips the scales in your favor. It’s the rage that grabs him by the back of his jacket and slams him sideways, causing the satisfying smash of his head against metal, before yanking him backward off of his feet and onto the floor. It’s the rage that stuns him into inaction as you straddle his waist and bring your fist down across his jaw again and again. It’s the rage that screams down at him with words you barely even hear.  
  
“You think you can just treat people like that?! Drain them dry and just fucking throw them away! Rip her to shreds and leave her to drown!! What the fuck gives you the right?! _You useless pathetic coward_!!” It isn’t until you’re standing five feet away from him and fighting against a pair of strong arms wrapped around your waist that you even realize there are now other people in the hall with you.  
  
“Stop fighting me, Quinn! Fuck! Just calm the _fuck_ down!” the person holding you yells, and that small part of you underneath the rage that’s still aware is surprised to recognize the voice as Santana’s. “Just calm down, it’s okay.” Her voice sounds more level and controlled now than before. “You’re okay now. Everything’s all right, I promise. Just calm down.” As you force yourself to concentrate on her voice the rage leaves you just as quickly as it appeared. You lean back against her tiredly and her arms finally loosen their grip around you, now only holding instead of trapping. “Jesus, Quinn,” she almost whispers as she turns you around to face her, “what the hell happened?” You just stare up at her silently, feeling too drained to speak even if you did have any idea how to explain what she just saw. She reaches a hand up to your face and gently wipes tears from your cheeks that you didn’t even know were there. The relief you feel at someone else being the strong one for once, at being able to break down while _someone else_ takes care of _you_ , slams into you like a tidal wave and your legs nearly give out from it. The next thing you know you’re practically molded to Santana, hands clutching at her back and tears quickly soaking the left shoulder of her uniform. “All right, it’s okay, I’ve got you,” she whispers into your ear, running one hand through your hair and dragging the other slowly up and down your back. “Just breathe, Quinn. Everything’s gonna be okay.”  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
You stand silently in Ms. Pillsbury’s office off to the side with your hands tucked into your pockets and your head turned down to the floor. Brittany stands to your left with an arm around your back protectively, her head leaning down against yours and a hand rubbing up and down your arm. You both listen patiently as Santana talks across the desk at Ms. Pillsbury, lying on your behalf. She tells the woman how she saw Karofsky pinning you against the lockers, hands running all over you and lips trying to force themselves against yours. She tells her how he’s been harassing you for weeks now with constant disgusting comments and how he tries to take advantage of your condition by insisting that the two of you were always hooking up before and that it was time to start falling back into old habits. If you had any strength left you might smile at how convincing she is and quietly whisper to Brittany that she should be considering law school if she isn’t already. When Santana’s finally done Ms. Pillsbury leaves to go across the hall and talk to Figgins. Santana moves to stand in front of you and you raise your head up to look at her.  
  
“You wanna tell me what the hell happened out there?”  
  
“He just . . . . pissed me off,” you explain quietly with a small shrug. She just stares at you for a few seconds, knowing that there’s more to the story but deciding not to push.  
  
A few minutes later Ms. Pillsbury comes back into the office with Principal Figgins following behind her. He says that given the circumstances surrounding the incident and the stressful nature of your condition they have agreed to only suspend you for a day. He also says that he’s putting you on probation for the rest of the semester and if you set so much as _one foot_ out of line again he _will_ expel you. You’ve seen the shit that happens in this school and even as he issues the threat you already know it’s bullshit, but his tone and wording reminds you too much of the Fabrays and you feel your hands instantly clench into weak fists in your pockets. You take a deep breath, nod, thank him for being so understanding, and promise that you’ll behave perfectly from now on.   
  
Santana drives you home and Brittany sits in the backseat with you, again with her arm around you and her head against yours, holding a sandwich bag full of ice against your right hand. As you stare out the window at a Lima that looks almost deserted at this time of day Mimic Rachel finally breaks her silence for the first time since the bathroom. She whispers that she’s proud of you for sticking up for her in your own fucked up way, but that beating the shit out of David Karofsky isn’t going to do a _damn_ thing to help _her_. You sigh and lean into Brittany a little more and she squeezes the arm wrapped around you and presses a soft kiss to the side of your head. You close your eyes and just concentrate on the feeling of her against you, the feeling of being held and taken care of. For the first time you start to think that maybe you and Rachel don’t have to be alone in all of this, that maybe you _can_ reach out to someone else for help, that maybe Quinn Fabray _should have_ a long time ago. Santana pulls into the driveway and the next thing you know Brittany is cradling you like an oversized toddler and carrying you to the front door and you’re too tired to even object. By the time she gently lies you down on your bed upstairs you’re almost completely asleep. The last thing you remember is muttering something to her about how you think she could be an excellent first mate.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
As you slowly start to wake up, flashes of a dream with you and Rachel sunbathing on the deck of a yacht still playing in your head, you realize that you’re laying on top of something warm and soft and _breathing_.  
  
“Rach?” you mumble quietly, tightening your right arm around her waist and pulling yourself into her side a little more. Her chest shakes lightly under your head as she lets out a soft laugh.  
  
“Not quite,” she says with an amused voice and it takes you nearly a minute to wake up enough to register the words. You finally force your eyes open and they’re met with a sea of red, white, and black that you recognize immediately. You move your left arm underneath you and slowly push yourself up enough to look at Brittany, torn between feeling insanely relieved that you’re not alone and completely panicked at the thought of having to explain why the hell you were calling out for Rachel Berry in your sleep. “It’s okay, Quinn,” she says after a moment with a grin, “we know.”  
  
“Know what?” you ask slowly, deciding it’s best to figure out what exactly it is Brittany thinks she knows before offering up anything yourself.  
  
“We know that you’re fucking Berry,” you hear from across the room and turn your head to see Santana sitting in the chair at your desk and flipping through a magazine. You consider denying it for a moment and insisting that they’re crazy but you honestly just don’t have the strength for it.  
  
“Oh.” You hang your head and idly notice that you’re still cuddled up to Brittany with an arm slung around her yet you don’t really feel the need to move. “ _That._ ” Brittany laughs again, tightening the arm around your back and squeezing your hip.  
  
“Don’t listen to her, it’s actually really cute,” Brittany insists with a smile and you roll your eyes and sigh as you finally sit up and scoot back closer to the headboard.  
  
“Not lately,” you mutter to yourself as you get settled. “When did you figure it out?”  
  
“A while ago,” she responds cryptically and you start mentally flipping through every interaction you’ve ever had with Rachel that they could’ve seen, trying to find out where exactly you screwed up. “But I didn’t tell San until a couple days ago,” she continues as she sits up and slides back until she’s level with you, “when it looked like things might be going bad.” Santana takes that as her cue and tosses the magazine on the desk as she stands up.  
  
“ _Apparently,_ ” she starts as she takes a seat on the edge of the bed, leaning on her left arm and tucking her foot underneath her right leg as it dangles off the side, “Brit here put it all together sometime _last fucking year_ but didn’t think to mention it to _me_ until like a week ago when you started going all anti-social and crazy.” You feel a little shocked at how long Brittany has seemingly known this secret that Rachel was so sure had been kept perfectly, but mostly you just feel glad that you won’t have to carefully avoid questions or just flat-out lie anymore. Not today at least. In the back of your mind Mimic Rachel demands that you snap out of this immediately and start taking some sort of action because this is sure to have dire consequences, and probably soon. But her voice is weak and distant, even your inner masochist seems too tired to put up much of a fight, and you hardly even pay it any attention. You’ve spent the last few weeks second-guessing every move, every decision, and every word, always wondering if it was the wrong one and would it come back to ruin the two of you. You’re tired of trying to predict consequences and always stay three steps ahead.  
  
“Last year?” you ask Brittany, more out of curiosity than anything else.  
  
“Yeah,” she answers simply, drawing her legs up the bed to cross them in front of her. “Sometime between you dating Finn and you dating Puck.”  
  
“How?” you question despite yourself. You know her answer is irrelevant since it will be centered around something from a life you don’t even remember, but your constant nagging obsession for information rears its ugly head and forces the question out of you.  
  
“I don’t know. I mean sometimes you guys were a little obvious to anyone bothering to look.” Your expression must look a little offended because she just quirks an eyebrow up at you and shrugs. “Sorry.”  
  
“Don’t take it too hard, Fabray,” Santana says with an easy voice and slaps at your leg lightheartedly. “Look, the way we figure it, this all probably started somewhere during freshman year,” she pauses just long enough to give you a questioning look and for you to respond with a small nod before continuing, “so really you should just be proud you managed to keep it from her for that long. Seriously. The girl reads people like a fucking book.”  
  
“People are easy,” Brittany says offhandedly with another shrug, watching her left hand intently as it traces the patterns on your quilt. “Way easier than, like, _Biology_. Or those weird U-shaped graph things in math class.” You and Santana turn to look at her for a moment and then look back at each other as you both start laughing. “You guys are just jealous of my mad skills,” she says with a smirk causing you and Santana to laugh just a little harder before she finally starts laughing too. The three of you calm down after a minute or so and you sigh, but for the first time in what feels like forever it isn’t a sigh of exhaustion or frustration or defeat, it just feels relaxed and something almost like content. You lean over to rest your head on Brittany’s shoulder and she curls a long arm around your waist as she tilts her head down against yours almost like a habit.  
  
“Are you always this cuddle-y?” you ask after a moment as your left hand reaches over to play with the pleats of Brittany’s skirt absentmindedly.  
  
“Sometimes. Depends on the person. Plus, you look like you could really use a cuddle.” You smile to yourself as you feel a sudden swell of gratitude for these two girls who somehow seemed to just appear the moment you _really_ needed them.  
  
“Thanks,” you tell her quietly, hoping that she can hear the sincerity infused in the word.  
  
“You’re welcome,” she says easily and you smile again as you detect the same sincerity lurking in the background of her response. Your eyes shift over to Santana, who’s just listening and grinning at Brittany with a look that’s almost adorable, a look that disappears the second she realizes she’s being watched. The instant her eyes lock with yours her grins becomes a scowl and she gives you a look that you can only describe as the facial equivalent of a body check and you barely manage to keep yourself from laughing.  
  
“So don’t take this the wrong way or anything,” you begin cautiously after a few seconds, leaning off of Brittany to sit up straight but not moving enough to dislodge her arm from it’s position around your waist, “but why are you guys still here? And like, being nice to me and everything?”  
  
“Hey, I can _be_ nice, okay,” Santana counters defensively. You raise a skeptical eyebrow at her and she huffs and rolls her eyes. “I just . . . . _prefer_ not to . . . _waste my niceness_ on people who are . . . . you know, stupid or lame or annoying.”  
  
“So pretty much everyone then?”  
  
“She’s very conservative with her kindness,” Brittany supplies helpfully.  
  
“Yes, thank you,” Santana says as she gestures in Brittany’s direction, “exactly. I see no reason to be nice to people who don’t fuckin’ deserve it,” she finishes simply with a shrug.  
  
“So what makes me deserve it _now_?” you ask her before you can stop yourself. You know you should just let it go and stop looking a gift horse in the mouth but, like always, your curiosity gets the better of you. “Especially after how I’ve apparently treated you guys like shit for the last few years.” Santana holds your gaze for just a second before sighing and rolling her eyes again.  
  
“Brittany thought we should stay, at least until you woke up, since you seemed to be,” she pauses for a moment as she searches her mind for the right words, “having a particularly rough day.” She’s quiet again for a bit, her eyes switching back and forth between you and Brittany. “And _I_ thought you could probably use someone who can . . . .” she trails off and quickly glances over at Brittany before looking back at you, “relate.” You watch her for a beat before turning your head to look at the girl beside you with questioning eyes. She answers silently with a grin and a small nod. “And despite the fact that my parents aren’t _nearly_ as _batshit crazy_ as yours–”  
  
“And they pretty much love me,” Brittany interrupts with a smile and Santana gestures toward her and gives you a look of agreement.  
  
“And that Brit and I are a little . . . . . less _secretive_ than you and Berry.” You scoff to yourself at the word.  
  
“I think ‘secretive’ might be a bit of an understatement,” you point out with a grin and Santana smirks back.  
  
“Yeah, apparently.” She rolls her eyes again and shakes her head. “But even though our situations aren’t _quite_ the same thing I _can_ understand what you’re going through. Better than Matt or Tina anyway,” she adds after a beat with a grin. “The lying and avoiding questions and dating guys you have _absolutely_ no interest in.” Her expression turns slightly more serious and she locks her eyes onto yours. “It can drive you crazy if you let it.”  
  
“Yeah. Apparently,” you echo back to her softly as your gaze drops down to the quilt in front of you. You suddenly notice again how tired you feel.  
  
“You just have to _not let it_ ,” Brittany says like it’s the easiest thing in the world and you breathe out a short laugh as you raise your head to stare at some random spot on the wall in front of you.  
  
“Right, sure. Just . . . . don’t let it,” you say mockingly with a shrug and a nod of your head. You hate yourself for saying it, especially when the arm around your waist suddenly disappears and you feel Brittany lean away from you slightly, but your mouth seems to have a mind of it’s own. “Got it.”  
  
“Hey!” Santana half-shouts and snaps her fingers in your line of view. Both sounds cause you to jump just a little and immediately turn your attention back to her. “We’re trying to help you here. But if you’d prefer we can just go and leave you to wallow in your self-destructive bullshit.” You stare at each other for a few seconds in a silent challenge before you finally sigh and admit defeat.  
  
“No. I’m sorry,” you tell Santana, surprised at the small layer of attitude in your voice. You turn to look at Brittany and this time when you speak your voice is only earnest. “I’m sorry Brittany.”  
  
“It’s okay,” she assures you with a smile that you can’t help but return, even if yours is a much smaller version.  
  
“Okay,” Santana says sounding satisfied and the two of you turn to give her your attention again. “Now, granted, whatever’s going on with you and Berry seems to be _way_ more fucked up than me and Brit.” Again you breathe out a laugh at the understatement before raising your eyebrows in silent agreement. “But the bottom line is still the same; do you want her enough to fight for her?”  
  
“It’s not that easy, Santana.”  
  
“It _is_ , actually.” She cuts you off before you can even utter a single excuse. “At the end of the day all that other shit doesn’t matter. The assholes at school, your parents, even the fucking amnesia is irrelevant. It all boils down to _one thing_ ; is she worth it?” Her eyes shift over to Brittany as she grins and you feel relieved at the short break from the sudden intensity of the conversation. “Because if she _is_ ,” her gaze settles back on you but her eyes are softer than before, “then you do whatever it takes. You fight like hell for her.” The next thing you know Brittany moves from her spot beside you to lean forward and pull Santana in for a kiss. It’s short and almost chaste and you can’t help the feeling that you’re suddenly intruding when you see the look on Santana’s face as Brittany pulls away from her just enough to make eye contact.  
  
“I love you, you know that?” Brittany whispers, dragging a thumb back and forth across Santana’s cheek.  
  
“That’s what makes you worth the fight,” Santana responds quietly with a smile and instantly your heart starts breaking. You suddenly feel cold and empty and like you could cry for days. Exhaustion crashes back into you and you wish like hell that Rachel was here, that you could hold her and listen to the sound of her laugh without having to fight the entire fucking world for it. “Shit. We gotta go Brit,” Santana says suddenly, standing up off the bed and distracting you from your thoughts. “Schuester will kill us if we miss practice three days before Sectionals,” she explains as Brittany stands and they start toward the door, “and I _really_ don’t want to listen to another fucking lecture about ‘making Glee Club a priority.’” She rolls her eyes and the corner of your mouth twitches up in an understanding grin. As they reach the door Brittany suddenly spins around and walks back over to throw her arms around you in a tight hug.  
  
“Everything will be all right, Quinn. Just try and get some sleep, okay?” she whispers before pulling away from you just enough to quickly kiss the top of your head. If it were anyone else it would probably make you feel like a five year-old and then make you feel like slapping them, but you can’t seem to do anything but grin at Brittany as she moves back into your line of view. She smiles back for just a second and then they’re both out the door. “And ice your hand again before you go back to sleep!” she yells up the stairs and you laugh to yourself as you hear the front door shut behind them. You take a minute to examine the hand in question and discover that it actually doesn’t look too bad. Your knuckles are red and a bit darker than normal but overall it’s a lot better than you expected.  
  
As you make your way downstairs and across the house toward the kitchen you try desperately to hold on to some of the peace and easiness that Santana and Brittany had brought with them but you can already feel it slipping away, being slowly replaced by the pain and misery that you always seem to bring with you. Even so, it doesn’t feel as overwhelming as it usually does and as you grab the ice pack from the top shelf of the freezer door you feel something almost like hope burning in the background. It’s small and faint but it’s there and you think it’s as good a start as any.   
  
By the time you get back to your room the tiredness from before has crept back out of it’s hiding place and you feel like you could sleep for a week. You wrap the ice pack around your hand, hissing at the feel of it against your skin, and drop down on top of the bed not even bothering to get under the covers. As you lay there with sleep quickly threatening the edges of your mind Mimic Rachel speaks again.  
  
“ _So. What do we do now?_ ” You consider her question for just a moment as you grab the pillow not currently under your head and hug it close to you. It’s a poor substitute for her but it’s better than nothing at all.  
  
“Now,” you mumble to the empty room, as your eyelids become impossibly heavy, “I fight to keep you.”  
  
  
  
  


**THURSDAY**

  
  
When you wake up you’re shocked to find that the clock reads 11:17 because you can clearly see sunlight outside your window, which would mean you slept for nearly an entire day. Even more shocking than that though is the fact that you don’t remember waking up a single time the whole night. You can’t even remember the last time you got through an entire night without a nightmare ripping you from sleep and slamming you back into reality with a chill in your blood and tears on your cheeks. You feel the corners of your mouth start to lift up into a grin and by the time you’re under the cool spray of the shower you’re smiling like an idiot.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
As you make your way downstairs to the kitchen in search of something to eat you’re surprised to find Judy there, coffee mug in her hand and papers spread out on the counter in front of her, since most days she’s gone before you even leave for school. You wonder if maybe she always leaves so early simply to avoid you and if every day she circles back around to the house once she’s sure you’ll be gone. The thought doesn’t upset you nearly as much as you think it probably should.  
  
“Hello Quinn,” she says evenly, glancing up as you enter the room, before taking a sip of her coffee, which you’re sure is more than a little Irish, and going back to her papers.   
  
“Mother,” you respond accordingly, hating the sound and feel of the word. About a week or so after you woke up you’d made the mistake of addressing her as ‘Judy’ and had received a long lecture in respect and manners that you have absolutely no desire to hear again.  
  
“I see you’re off to a bit of a late start this morning.” Her tone sounds purely conversational but some part of you insists that there’s disapproval and condescension in it. You know she’s not actually looking for a response so you don’t bother with one as you cross the room and grab a box of cereal and a bowl. “You know,” she starts after your cereal is poured and you’re searching the refrigerator for the half pint of milk, “your father and I were quite disappointed when your principal called to inform us of your actions yesterday.” You pour the milk into your bowl and roll your eyes. “Really Quinn, fighting? It’s barbaric and quite distasteful.” You put the milk away and start stirring your cereal, keeping your back to her and your mouth shut. “It is rude and disrespectful not to look at someone when they are speaking to you, Quinn.” Her voice is angry and much louder than before and it causes your skin to jump and your breath to hitch. You pick up your bowl and slowly turn to face her. “Amnesia or no, I’m afraid we simply can’t tolerate that kind of behavior.” Her voice is quiet and calm again but the anger is still strong in her eyes. “And unless you decide to straighten up and start conducting yourself properly, and soon, I’m afraid your father and I will have no choice but to take action.” You stare at each other in silence for a few moments and for the first time ever you’re completely terrified of Judith Fabray. Something about the tone in her voice and the look in her eyes sends chills through you and you’re starting to understand why Rachel was so adamant that they never find out.  
  
“I understand,” you reply with a voice not quite as steady as you’d hoped. You wait silently until she goes back to her papers, signaling that the conversation is over, before you leave the room. On your way back upstairs you shake your head at the fact that you can’t ever seem to catch a break, that you can’t even have _one decent day_ without something ripping it to shreds. Half an hour later, when you hear the front door shut and her car pull out of the driveway, you immediately head back downstairs and to the Fabrays bedroom. You pick up the bottle of sleeping pills from the nightstand on her side of the bed and shake a capsule from it and swallow it dry. Since the kitchen this day is quickly becoming just like all the rest and you really don’t feel like suffering through countless more hours of it. As you lie down on your bed and wait for sleep to come you pray that tomorrow will be better. That you can finally have just one decent day.  
  
  
  
  


**FRIDAY**

  
  
When Matt picks you up for school he greets you with a smile like always and for the first time in days you respond with a smile of your own.  
  
“Hey Tyson,” he says with a smirk and then remembers to elaborate before you even think to give him a questioning look, “he’s a boxer. Kind of a crazy one.” It feels like information you already had and you figure someone must have mentioned it to you before.  
  
“Are you trying to say I’m crazy?” you ask with a laugh.  
  
“Only kind of,” he says innocently as he reverses down the driveway and you smile again. The conversation is light and easy for the rest of the trip and you start to think that maybe you might just get your decent day after all. When you woke up this morning there was still a feeling of painful loss at your situation and worry about Rachel and how you were ever going to fix everything, but more than all of that there was the hope and belief that things _could_ be fixed. Some small part of you was suddenly sure that there _was_ a way to make everything work and if you tried hard enough you were bound to find it.  
  
  


***************

  
  
  
You get to school a little over half an hour earlier than usual because Mr. Schuester had insisted on meeting before school as well as after since Sectionals were tomorrow. As the two of you walk into an empty music room and take your seats, Matt continues his rant about Mike.  
  
“So I said look dude, you’re always out with the football guys or doing something with Sarah every time I text you to try and hang out and I don’t ever get mad about that. So you can’t be pissed at me for blowing you off _one_ night. I mean I had shit to do! So if I can’t get pissed about it then neither can you, dude. That shit goes both ways.”  
  
“Like Thirteen,” you say instantly with a smirk.   
  
“What?” he asks, his eyebrows scrunched in confusion. You laugh and roll your eyes at yourself.  
  
“Nothing, it’s . . . . never mind.” You gesture for him to ignore it and continue before something suddenly occurs to you. “Wait. That line, it’s – it’s from a TV show,” you say, more thinking out loud to yourself than actually talking to Matt.  
  
“Okay,” he says slowly, still looking confused.  
  
“From like _two years_ ago.” He opens his mouth to speak again but you hold up a hand to stop him. “Hold on, just – just let me think for a second.” You start with that one single line, replaying the moment from the episode in your mind with perfect clarity. Slowly you dig deeper, almost afraid that any sudden thoughts will scare the memory back to wherever the hell it’s been for the last month and a half. You remember the rest of the episode and watching the finale later on and being pissed when they killed Amber. You can’t control yourself anymore and suddenly your mind goes crazy, flipping through subject after subject – birthdays, school projects, cheerleading camps, Sunday sermons, family reunions – and finding everything right where it should be. Like maybe it had been there this entire time and you just never bothered to look. “Holy shit,” you whisper under your breath and laugh, as you _finally_ become Quinn Fabray again.


	11. Chapter 11

The whole thing feels like a dream. A really long and incredibly vivid one, but still it doesn’t feel real. It feels more like a story you read somewhere instead of something that actually happened to you. The logical part of your brain knows that seven weeks have passed and you can remember what happened during them, but you still feel like just last night you were driving your car out to meet Rachel.

“Quinn?” The sound of Matt’s voice just a few inches to your right causes you to jump a little as you turn to look at him; you’d completely forgotten he was there. “You okay?” he asks slowly. You stare at him for a second before smiling and laughing lightly.

“I remember. Everything.” You shake your head and breathe out another laugh, still not quite able to believe it yourself. “I remember everything.” You look around the room and laugh again as you realize that you’re sat in the middle of the front row, your regular spot before the accident.

“What, like just now?”

“Yeah, pretty much,” you answer with a glance and start looking around again, letting memories of the room replay in your mind.

“Well that’s kinda anti-climactic.”

“I know right!” you tell him, throwing your hands up in front of you as you both start laughing. “I figured if it ever did happen that something crazy would trigger it and then it would just be like this rush of memories like my whole life was flashing before my eyes or something. But no, they were kinda just . . . suddenly there.”

“A little part of me was convinced that you were just gonna pass out like five minutes before we were supposed to go out on stage tomorrow and then we’d finally wake you up at like the last second and PUFF! Memories intact.” He tells the story with a grin and an excited look in his eyes and you can’t help but grin back at him.

“Really, puff? That’s what you’re going with?” He suddenly scrunches his eyebrows together and frowns at you.

“You know, Amnesia Quinn never used to interrupt my stories with snarky comments.” He stares at you disapprovingly and you laugh and raise your hands in surrender.

“I’m sorry. Go ahead.”

“Thank you. So, PUFF,” he says with heavy emphasis and you giggle again, “memories. And then Mr. Schue would suddenly say that you should sing the ballad instead and you’d go out on stage and sing some dramatic and meaningful song and you’d get a standing ovation and they would just hand us the trophy right then.” He grins again, looking very pleased with himself and you just shake your head and laugh.

“Wow. That is really dramatic.” His grin turns into a smirk and he rolls his eyes.

“Whatever, you’re just mad because my version is way more awesome than your lame ‘Oh I just walked into school and there all my memories were, la de da.’” You laugh and reach over to smack him on the arm.

“Whatever, Mattie.”

“Hey now,” his expression immediately becomes stern and he points a finger at you, “none of that.” You both start laughing again and you turn your head to look at the door as Puck, Finn, Mike, and Artie enter the room arguing over the most effective strategies for some videogame. “So what’s the plan here?” Matt asks as he notices them too. “Are we shouting it from the rooftops or what?” Finn smiles and waves at you as he and Puck walk past to take a seat in the top row and you grin and wave back at him.

“Not just yet,” you answer, turning back to look at him. “None of it really feels real yet, you know. I think I need a little time to make it all make sense in my head before I tell everyone else.”

“Fair enough,” he says with a nod and you give him a grateful smile before you suddenly hear Rachel’s voice from across the room lecturing Tina about proper breathing exercises. Your head immediately whips around toward the door and the second you lay eyes on her the rush of memories you’d been expecting before hits you like a train. It feels like there are a thousand different clips of you and Rachel playing at light speed on a dozen different screens in your head; the first time you saw her when you were both too young to even imagine how important you’d be to each other one day, your first kiss in that ridiculous clearing and how it felt like the only right thing you’d done in your entire life, giving her a necklace with a silver Star of David for her sixteenth birthday last year because it was something she could wear whenever she wanted without really raising any questions, the look on her face two years ago when you first told her you loved her and the love and absolute relief in her eyes a few months later when she finally started to believe the words. You feel a smile begin to stretch across your face and you just watch her as she slowly makes her way into the room, talking animatedly to Tina. “You wanna hear some of my super dramatic theories about the whole you and Rachel thing?” Matt suddenly says but you barely even hear him. “Because I’ve got like five of them.”

“I’m in love with her,” you tell him simply, your eyes never leaving Rachel. You hear him laugh and your smile grows impossibly wider at finally being able to say the words out loud to someone.

“I said dramatic, funny girl, not insane.” You glance over at him without a word as you stand up and start walking toward her. You’re about five steps away from the two of them when they both notice you and suddenly Tina is blocking your way with both hands held out in front of her.

“No Quinn, don’t punch her face!” You stop abruptly to avoid running into her and fight against the immediate Quinn Fabray instinct to loudly order her out of your way, instead choosing to just stare down at her in confusion.

“What the fuck?”

“Look, I know she can be annoying sometimes, okay a lot of the time, but we need her to sing tomorrow so I can’t allow the two of you to engage in any sort of . . . fisticuffs,” she explains quickly and you quirk an eyebrow at her and start to grin. You have no idea what she’s talking about but her twitchy panic is kind of entertaining. “Ooh! Punch Kurt!” she suddenly says with an encouraging smile and gestures an arm toward the boy in question as he and Mercedes approach the three of you on their way into the room. “He’s totally replaceable!” You hear Kurt stop long enough to gasp and give an offended huff before moving toward the rest of the club and you suddenly remember your encounter with Karofsky two days ago and finally put together why the hell Tina would think you’re looking to punch someone.

“Oh,” you groan out slowly as the realization hits you and then roll your eyes with a laugh. “Jesus El Hamster, I’m not gonna punch her I just wanna talk to her.” Tina stares up at you for a moment before squinting her eyes in disbelief. “I swear,” you tell her sincerely and slap on the ‘Quinn Fabray face of innocence’, “no violence.”

“Fine,” she finally relents after a few seconds, her eyes still squinty and not quite convinced, and slowly starts walking away from the two of you. You laugh lightly and grin as you watch her walk away backwards in order to keep an eye on you before you turn around to face Rachel. The sudden eye contact is almost too much and you feel your muscles twitch with the need to reach out and touch her.

“Hey you,” you finally say with a small grin.

“Hi,” Rachel responds slowly after a beat with a curious look on her face.

“Can I talk to you for a minute?” you ask and quickly glance around before adding, “Somewhere that’s not, ya know, in the middle of a room full of people.” She stares for another moment or two before she sighs and gives you an answer.

“What about?”

“We really should talk somewhere else.”

“I don’t have time for this, Quinn,” she says tiredly and moves to walk around you but you block her way and lift a hand up to stop her.

“Make time.”

“Excuse me?” she snaps back with a raised eyebrow.

“Hey Quinn, hey Rachel.” You both turn toward the door as Brittany and Santana walk through it, Brittany with a smile and a wave and Santana with a bored expression.

“Hello Brittany,” Rachel says with a quick smile before turning back toward you. Once Rachel’s back is to them they both give you a knowing smirk as they pass and you just grin and shake your head as you focus on Rachel again.

“Look, whatever it is that you think we need to talk about now is neither the time nor the place,” Rachel starts again.

“Yeah, that’s why I said –”

“And whatever it is,” she says just a little louder, cutting off any argument from you completely, “I’m sure that it can wait.” She tries to step around you again and again you move in front of her. She tries the other direction and you slide over to cut her off.

“Will you stop fuckin’ doing that?”

“Move out of my way.” She’s starting to get angry so you decide to try one last time and pray that she just gives in and lets you do this the easy way.

“Rachel we need to talk. Now. Please come with me.” Your voice is earnest and your eyes are pleading but she just takes a deep breath and looks away.

“No.” You sigh and shake your head as she walks past you.

“Always so stubborn,” you mutter to yourself with a grin and laugh. “This is not going to go well.” You take a deep breath and turn around. “I’m in love with you Rachel Berry.” You don’t exactly yell it but you make sure to say it loud enough for her to hear, along with everyone else in the room if the instant silence is any indication. She freezes mid-step and her shoulders drop as you hear the air rush out of her. The entire room is completely still for a long second before suddenly everyone starts talking all at the same time. Your focus is still on Rachel so you don’t hear most of what’s said, but you do manage to pick up a “What the frak” from either Artie or Mike and a muttered “Overkill, Fabray” from Santana. Finally Rachel slowly turns and starts walking toward you and she’s furious. Most of the time you find her ‘pissed off face’ kind of adorable but right now is definitely not one of those times. You barely even see her hand move before you feel it burn across your cheek and send your head twisting to the side. There’s a low collective gasp from the rest of the Glee Club immediately followed by even more excited chatter. “Rachel –” you start as you hold a hand up and try to stop her long enough for you to explain, but she’s having none of it.

“What the fuck is the matter with you? Do you have any idea what you’ve just done?!”

“I set us free,” you answer simply and she scoffs.

“Set us free?! What the hell gives you the right! Who the fuck do you think you are?”

“I’m the girl that’s in love with you.”

“Stop saying that!” she yells loudly and her voice sounds almost panicked. She leans in close to you and you notice that she’s starting to shake. “You don’t love me. You can’t love me. I told you it won’t happen twice!” The day in the clearing two weeks ago suddenly flashes into your mind, how she had no idea why you would’ve ever loved her in the first place and how certain she was that the new Quinn never could. Your heart breaks at the memory and you feel the familiar burn of tears behind your eyes. It had taken Rachel months to even start accepting the fact that you genuinely wanted her and cared about her. Even after two years together you still caught the doubt lingering in her eyes every now and then and you hated yourself for it every single time.

“Rach,” you say softly and try to push your tears down as you reach out for her.

“No!” She slaps your hand away from her. “Don’t touch me! You’re not her!” She shoves at your chest frantically trying to push you away from her. Her shove forces you to take a step back but as soon as you regain your balance you move back to her. “No!” She shoves you again but this time you’re prepared and you hold your ground. “You can’t be her,” she shoves again, “can’t love me,” another shove, “she’s gone, left me here.”

“Rachel, stop.” She doesn’t even hear you, just starts swinging her arms a little more wildly.

“And now you’ve ruined everything!”

“Rach, please stop. Listen to me.”

“I lost her! All of it was for nothing!” You finally manage to get a hold of both of her arms but she still keeps twisting and jerking trying to get away from you.

“Rachel, baby, stop. Look at me. Look at me, Rach.” She finally stops fighting and slowly looks up at you with watery eyes and tear stained cheeks. “It’s me. Rachel, it’s me.” She stares into your eyes hesitantly, searching.

“Quinn?” Her voice is quiet and fragile and disbelieving. You take just a moment to look at the girl in front of you, small and beautiful and almost terrified to believe you, and you think for the hundredth time that you might be the worst thing to ever happen to Rachel Berry. But even as your tears finally spill over you can’t help but smile just a little. Since the first time you met Rachel you’ve never made the right choice about anything, not the right choice for her anyway. For a long time you thought maybe you just weren’t capable of doing anything except hurting her. But now you know different.

“I didn’t fall asleep, Rach.” You feel her arms tremble in your hands as she tries to hold back a sob. “There was a deer in the road and I swerved. I didn’t fall asleep.” Before you even finish your sentence she practically collapses into you and instantly your arms circle around her to hold her close. Her grip around your waist is tight and her tears against your neck are hot but you can hear the change in them, hear the joy and relief now in her cries where before there was only pain and desperation. You bring a hand up to run through her hair as you kiss her temple. “I’m so sorry, Rachel. For everything. God, I was so stupid and naïve and . . . ” you suddenly get a thousand little flashes of every single time you insulted her and laughed at her under the guise of keeping your secret and your tears pour out as you tighten your hold on her. You kiss the side of her head again and bury your face in her hair as you try desperately to force words past the tears. “I’m so sorry, baby. But it’s okay now. I’m here and I’m gonna fix everything, I promise. I promise, Rachel. I’ll fix it.” She doesn’t say anything, just burrows into you a little more and you’re perfectly content to hold her for as long as she’ll let you. That is, until you remember where exactly the two of you are. Your eyes snap open and you look around to see the entire Glee Club staring at you wide-eyed and talking over each other. You twist your head to look toward the door and make eye contact with a very stunned and uncomfortable looking Schuester and about ten other kids crowded together in the hallway just outside the room. “Shit. Shit, we gotta go Rach.”

“What? Go where?” She takes a step back from you as she asks, wiping at her tears and trying to get her emotions in check and you do the same.

“I don’t know, somewhere else.” This seems to remind her of where she is and her eyes widen as she quickly glances around at everyone.

“Shit.”

“Yeah. So we need to – Jesus!” You notice Brittany about half a second before she nearly tackles you in a running hug.

“Aww, you guys are so cute!” she says while practically squeezing the life out of you before she moves on to hug Rachel.

“Actually,” Santana starts as she tosses your book bag at you, “you kinda look like hell.”

“Thanks,” you say with a laugh as you catch the bag and loop it over your shoulder.

“Be nice,” Brittany scolds with a light slap to Santana’s arm as she moves to stand beside her. Santana just rolls her eyes and the two of you exchange a grin.

“You probably should get going though. Puck and Liberace have been texting like crazy for like five minutes now so I’d say you’ve got maybe an hour before the entire fuckin’ town knows about you two.” You sigh and shake your head as you feel Rachel silently appear at your side.

“God, I hate this town.”

“Where are you guys going?” Brittany asks and you just look at her and shrug. “Well when you get back the four of us are definitely going out.” Rachel grabs your hand, slipping her fingers between yours, and you give Brittany a smile.

“Sure Brit, as soon as we get back.” You and Santana share a look, both of you knowing that you won’t be coming back for a while.

“Hell of a way to fight, Fabray,” Santana says with a smile before linking her pinkie with Brittany’s and pulling her back toward the group. The two of you watch them walk away for a just a moment before you turn around and head for the door. Schuester stands just inside the doorway staring at you with confusion. You’re not sure how much he heard but you have no doubt he’ll be completely filled in by everyone in just a few seconds.

“Sorry Mr. Schue, but we’ve gotta go,” you tell him quickly as you walk past. For a second he looks like he’s about to say something but you don’t give him the chance as the two of you keep moving out into the hall. You’re met with a group of fifteen or twenty kids all yelling things at you and asking questions and, more importantly, blocking your way. You whistle to get their attention and put on your best Quinn Fabray bitch face. Everyone almost immediately shuts up and you can’t help but grin.

“Listen up. I want all of you to shut the fuck up and just go back to your shitty little lives because this is none of your goddamn business.” They slowly start to scatter and you let go of Rachel’s hand and put yours on the small of her back to lead her through the crowd. You walk down the hall for a few seconds before she laughs quietly and you raise an eyebrow at her.

“It really is you,” she says after another second with a small smile and then pulls away from you to go to her locker. You grin and laugh to yourself and follow after her. She gets her keys and her purse from her locker and you reach over her to grab her emergency bag of clothes. The two of you make your way out to the parking lot without another word as you try to figure out some sort of plan. As you get to Rachel’s car she hands you the keys and goes around to get in on the passenger side. It isn’t until you start the car and pull out of the lot that she finally breaks the silence. “Where are we going?”

“Anywhere but Lima. I just can’t be here right now, in the middle of the fallout. I just need some time. I need to catch my breath and figure everything out.” You glance over at her and she smiles at you like she still can’t believe you’re here. You smile back and reach over to grab the hand resting on top of her thigh lacing your fingers together as you turn your gaze back to the road. “I just need one day to be Quinn.”


	12. Chapter 12

As you walk across the parking lot of Watertown Rooms in the direction of room number six, a bag of fast food in one hand and a six-pack of water bottles in the other, you find yourself humming the intro to ‘Ace of Spades’ for what’s at least the tenth time since you heard it in that gas station fifteen minutes ago.

“Dammit!” you mutter as you catch yourself. “Stupid song.” You unlock the door and walk in to find Rachel still asleep. She’s sprawled out on her stomach with her head facing away from you and her hair thrown almost wildly over the pillow. You’ve been together two years but you can count on one hand the number of times you’ve been together like this, carefree and truly alone. You feel a smile creep over your face as you take a second to just look at her, sheet pooled at the base of her spine and her left hand curled into a ball and tucked under her chin. You sigh as you fight against the urge to go to her. The two of you still have a lot to talk about and you know full well that crawling back into bed with a naked Rachel Berry will result in very little talking. You reluctantly turn away from her and sit the bag of food on the small table by the door along with two bottles of water. You cross the room to crouch in front of the mini-fridge beside the dresser and start pulling the other bottles out of their plastic packaging. As you jam the last one in the small shelf on the door you suddenly hear a soft giggling behind you and it triggers another grin.

“You’re terribly cute when you sing the guitar riffs, you know.” She giggles again and it takes you a second before you realize that yes, you had been mumbling the first verse of that goddamn song again and yes, you had been right in the middle of singing the riffs like a fourteen year old boy playing air guitar. You stand up and turn to face her with your grin still in place. She’s rolled over onto her back and pulled the sheet up to her neck. You’ve always found it amusing how someone who constantly wears such short skirts can be so shy when it comes to actual nudity.

“It’s stuck in my head,” you admit with a shrug.

“I figured,” she responds as she yawns and stretches. “What time is it?” You flip your wrist upside down to get a look at your watch.

“Just after twelve.”

“What? How did that happen?”

“You uh, kind of passed out a little bit,” you say with a smirk. She stares at you for just a second before scoffing and rolling her eyes.

“Shut up.” She launches the pillow not currently under her head at you and you laugh as you bring a hand up to swat it away. She stretches again and just barely winces. “God. Are my clothes still in one piece?” She sits up, dragging the sheet with her as she glances around the room for her discarded clothes. You laugh again as you pick the pillow up and toss it back onto the bed. She leans over the side of the bed to dig around in her emergency bag on the floor as you crumple up the plastic in your hand and cross the room to throw it away.

 

“Yes, they’re still in one piece,” you toss over your shoulder as you go, “I’m not a caveman.” As you make your way back to the table to start unpacking the food she finally yanks out a shirt and quickly pulls it over her head before she responds.

“Well you can’t blame me for asking, you open a twelve-pack of soft drinks like a Bengal Tiger.”

“Hey, those perforations are crap!” you argue as you spin to face her, your arm outstretched and finger pointing. “They are purely for show.” She just chuckles and starts rummaging through her bag again so you turn your attention back to the food. “So apparently this town is only like two square miles and neither of those squares is very vegan friendly,” you hear movement behind you as she gets out of the bed and starts walking toward you, “so I just got us salads.” While you don’t necessarily share Rachel’s vegan views – hamburgers and ribs and bacon have all been very good to you over the years so you see no reason to turn your back on them now – you always try not to eat anything too terribly ‘un-vegan’ in front of her.

“Oh, thank God. I’m starving,” she mumbles from over your right shoulder. Her left arm sneaks around your waist as her right one reaches around you to grab one of the salads. “Thank you.” She lifts up to give you a quick kiss on the cheek before moving to take a seat in one of the chairs.

“You’re welcome.” You pick up one of the water bottles and place it in front of her before going to your own seat across from her. Nearly the second you hit the chair her bare legs come up to rest in your lap and your left hand automatically drops down to trace over her ankle as you start mixing up your salad. She looks up and grins at you before attacking her salad like it’s the first food she’s seen in days and you smile and shake your head. You raise your fork up for your first bite but something stops you. You pull back a little and sniff. “Good Lord. How did I not notice that before?” You put the fork down and stretch behind you to fling the door open.

“What are you doing?” Rachel asks as you spin back around and finally take a bite.

“Airing the room out. It smells like crazy, sweaty sex in here.” She snorts and grins.

“Crazy, sweaty, awesome, sex,” she mumbles around a mouthful of lettuce and you laugh and roll your eyes.

“Dork,” you tease as you toss a crouton at her.

“Other dork.” The two of you eat in comfortable silence for a few minutes before something suddenly occurs to you.

“Oh!” you start, pointing your fork up in the air for good measure. “Speaking of getting caught singing an embarrassing song in front of people.”

“Were we still speaking of that?” she asks as she takes a drink of water.

“We are now.” She grins and nods.

“Carry on.”

“I cannot believe you let me sing the fucking Goo Goo Dolls in front of the entire Glee Club.” She immediately starts laughing and it causes you to fail miserably at keeping your own grin in check.

“I was wondering when that was going to come up. And what do you mean let? What was I supposed to do about it?”

“Uh, set the damn piano on fire if you have to,” you tell her as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

“You love that song. You used to listen to it all the time.”

“Yeah, when I was fifteen and lame.” She chuckles again and again the corner of your mouth twitches up into a little grin. “And even if I do maybe still kind of like it that doesn’t mean I want to sing it in front of everybody. I mean you listen to ‘Faith’ all the time but I don’t see you busting out your George Michaels impression in the middle of a Glee rehearsal any time soon.”

“This is true,” she admits with a nod.

“Such a waste,” you mutter to yourself as you take another bite of salad.

“What do you mean a waste?”

“Obviously if I was going to have some big dramatic solo about the two of us it should’ve been ‘Where I Stood’ by Missy Higgins,” you say simply without really thinking as you grab your water bottle. You see her immediately start to flip through the Rolodex of songs in her head and decide to change the subject before she finds the song and starts running through the lyrics. “And you know Santana is never going to let me live it down,” you tell her before taking a drink.

“Please, Santana sang ‘There Are Worse Things I Could Do’ at Noah’s party last year.” You have to physically fight not to do a sitcom spit take as the memory suddenly flashes into your mind. After the Glee Club lost at Regionals last year Puck had insisted that the only thing left to do was to go to his house, which was vacant for the weekend, and get blind drunk and most everyone had been inclined to agree with him. Toward the end of the night Santana, drunk off her ass and stumbling everywhere, had produced an instrumental karaoke style version of the Grease soundtrack seemingly out of nowhere and started belting the song out in the middle of Puck’s living room.

“Oh my God!” you yell as you throw your head back and laugh loudly. “Oh my God, I completely forgot about that!”

“How could you have possibly forgotten that?” Rachel asks in disbelief. “It is . . . . seared into my memory.” She gets a disturbed look on her face as she stares off into the distance and you laugh again.

“Well you were sober,” you point out as you think back to the night in question, “way more than I was at least.” You had joined Glee to be closer to Rachel, and to make sure Finn stayed the hell away from her, but at some point you’d actually gotten invested in all of it and when you’d lost at Regionals you found yourself surprisingly upset. And the fact that you couldn’t curl up and take comfort in the arms of your girlfriend like most other kids your age had only upset you more and you’d started drinking almost the second you stepped through Puck’s front door. What had upset you the most though was seeing Rachel. She looked absolutely heartbroken all night, though she did her best to hide it, and you couldn’t do anything about it except risk a sad smile at her every now and then from across the room. So you spent the night drinking and trying to forget, like so many other nights before and after that one.

“Ah, that’s right. You big lush.” You clear your throat and raise an eyebrow at her. “Sorry, skinny lush.”

“Thank you.” She rolls her eyes and grins. “Plus, you were wearing that dress from Kurt’s damn makeover. My mind was kind of focused on other things.”

“It is a really good dress,” she says with a smile.

“It’s a goddamn torture device is what it is.” You bring the water bottle to your lips to take another drink and a drop of condensation rolls down the side of it and drops onto Rachel’s foot. You see it happen but she doesn’t and when the cold water hits her skin she jerks, causing her heel to slam solidly into your stomach. “Ow, fuck me!” She immediately sits up straight, pulling her feet out of your lap and bringing a hand up to cover her mouth.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry.” She mumbles from behind her hand and you glare at her when the last word dissolves into laughter.

“Yeah, your concern is very touching.” You groan as you bring a hand down to rub at the right side of your stomach. She didn’t even kick you that hard really but she must’ve hit a nerve or something because it sent little tingles of pain shooting across your stomach and down your thigh. “God, I think you hit my kidney or something.” She laughs again but quickly stifles it.

“Your kidneys are in the back, Quinn.”

“Yeah,” you scoff, “not anymore it isn’t. But my hipbone might be now,” you add with a pout as you groan again. “Sweet shit in a bucket.” She scrunches her forehead and shrugs.

“Why is it in a bucket? That seems highly unsanitary.”

“Really?” you ask and lift an eyebrow in her direction.

“What? It’s a valid question. That’s a very peculiar phrase.”

“You are the worst.” You pout again and she chuckles as she stands up and walks toward you.

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry.” She puts a hand on either side of your face and bends down to kiss you on top of the head. “I’ll fix it.” She moves past you and closes the door before coming back to kneel down beside you.

“Uh, Rach?” You glance down at her, wearing a tight black v-neck shirt, black boy shorts, and an innocent grin, and you hear a warning bell start to go off in your head. “What are you doing?”

“Kissing it better,” she replies simply before tugging your shirt up a few inches and leaning forward to softly press her lips to your hip. You take in a quick breath as your stomach muscles twitch and you feel her smile into your side. Her kisses become more insistent as she slowly makes her way across your stomach and brings her right hand up to grip at your knee.

“Rachel. Rach, stop,” you say weakly even as you lean back to give her better access. Her tongue just barely peeks out to run across your flesh as she slides her hand up your thigh and even through your jeans it’s like you can feel each individual ridge of her fingertips against your skin. You take another deep breath and steel your nerves. “Rachel, we need to talk.” Her hand moves just a little higher on your thigh as she straightens up to whisper in your ear.

“I don’t wanna talk,” she says in that voice that sends shivers down your spine. Everyone gets to hear Rachel Berry hit the high notes but you’re the only one who gets to hear her like this, voice low and scratchy like whiskey and gravel. Her tongue darts out to hit that spot just behind your ear before she slowly drags her teeth down the side of your neck with just enough pressure to drive you insane. You feel your entire body twitch as arousal shoots through you like lightening.

“That – that’s cheating,” you finally manage to stutter out and you can feel the laugh rumble through her chest as she kisses across your collarbone. “Rach, I’m – I’m serious,” you try again and she leans into you a little more, “we need to talk.”

“Uh-uh, don’t wanna,” she mumbles against your skin as she starts kissing back up your throat and her fingers start tracing slow circles on the inside of your thigh.

“Yeah, you never do.” She freezes against you, lips still against your neck and hand just laying on your thigh as you feel the air in the room shift. Admittedly it was kind of a low blow but it was all you could think of. She takes a deep breath and you feel it blow harshly across your skin.

“Fine.” She quickly pulls away from you and walks over to sit on the edge of the bed. During the hour long drive away from Lima this morning Rachel had asked when exactly you got your memories back and when you told her it had happened just a few minutes before everything went down the two of you started fighting. She was yelling that you had been stupid and impulsive and ruined everything on a whim and you argued that it was what you should’ve done from the beginning. Eventually you had stopped it by saying that you didn’t want to fight with her, not today, and the two of you had agreed to just be together today and leave the fights for another time. As you look at her now, back straight and jaw set, you know that agreement is about to be broken. Honestly, you’d like nothing more than to stay in this bubble the two of you have created where you’re blissfully happy and everything is fine. But everything isn’t fine and you’re running out of time to fix it. You turn sideways in your chair to face her and she just raises an eyebrow at you expectantly.

“Rachel . . .” you trail off not knowing where exactly to start.

“You’re the one that wanted to talk, Quinn. So talk. I’ll even give you a topic. What the fuck are we supposed to do now, huh? What’s ‘The Plan’ this time? Or did you even have time to come up with anything even resembling a plan during all your spontaneous life ruining?” Her voice is harsh now and even though you’d been expecting it you can’t help but feel the sting of it.

“It wasn’t spontaneous,” you say automatically as a weak defense as you stare down at your lap.

“Oh, really?” she says incredulously. “Those two minutes in the middle of the fucking choir room, talking to Matt no less, was plenty of time to think about everything and make a rational decision, was it?”

“I made the decision three months ago.” Your voice is strong but your head is still pointed toward the ground.

“Excuse me?” she says slowly. You look up at her and take a deep breath before you start.

“I made the decision a long time before today. And there is a plan. I turn eighteen in seven months –”

“Five and a half,” she corrects you distractedly as she stares off at some point behind you.

“What? Oh, right.” Even though you’ve had some time to reconcile your ‘amnesia life’ with your real one it still screws up your timelines sometimes. “So my parents will send me to some boarding school or de-gaying camp or something but in five and a half months I’ll be back and everything will be okay.”

“Just like that, huh?” she asks, still not looking at you.

“Look, Rachel it’ll all work out. I promise.”

“I can’t believe this.”

“What?” you ask cautiously, trying to catch her eye.

“I can’t believe you did this.” She shakes her head and finally makes eye contact for just a second before standing up off the bed to start pacing. “I can’t believe you just made this decision, this decision that completely changes our entire lives, without even talking to me about it or, God forbid, asking me if I was okay with it!”

“I tried to talk to you about it a hundred times, Rachel!” You throw your arms in the air as you quickly stand up to join the fight. “But every time I tried to bring it up you just shut me down!”

“Because there was nothing to talk about!”

“It was killing us, Rachel!” She sighs and brings a hand up to rub at her temple.

“Please Quinn, not this fight again. How many times do I have to tell you that I’m fine before you start to actually fucking believe me? Before you finally stop with this idea that poor little Rachel needs to be saved from the big bad world?” She takes a few steps toward you and lowers her voice just a little as some of the anger starts to leave her. “I was fine. I’ve always been fine as long as I had you. But now you’ve decided to leave for six months, which is kind of counterproductive, wouldn’t you say?” You sigh and shake your head.

“I love you, Rachel. But you can be so fucking conceited sometimes.”

“What?” she practically growls at you.

“Every time we’ve had this fight, whenever I say that it’s hurting us too much or that we won’t make it through this, you always say I’m fine or I’ll be okay or stop worrying about me.” She shrinks into herself a little and takes a step away from you. “You’ve always been so adamant that I didn’t need to do this for you, but did you ever think that maybe I needed you to do this for me? That maybe I’m not okay.” Your voice cracks on the last word and you turn to take a few steps away from her and back toward the door, giving yourself enough time to get your emotions back under control.

“Quinn, I . . .” You turn back around and hold a hand up to stop her.

“Just . . . . just let me say this okay?” She stares at you for a few seconds with sad eyes before she finally just nods. You take a moment to try to organize your thoughts so you can be sure to say everything the right way but there’s only one thing screaming back and forth in your head. “I don’t know who I am anymore.” You sigh and hang your head as you finally admit it. “Am I this sarcastic, cursing, cigarette smoking, jeans and converse girl or the bitchy, heartless, religious head cheerleader who doesn’t give a shit about anyone but herself? Or am I some mixture of the two? Or maybe none of the above? I don’t know.” You slowly turn your head to the side to look at her and feel the corner of your mouth pull up into a small grin. “All I know is you, Rachel. You’re all I see.” You take a deep breath as you lean your head back on the door behind you trying to straighten out your thoughts again. “There’s always been that part of you that’s terrified of losing me, Rach. That’s convinced that one day I’ll just walk away or move on, because for some reason you think you need this more than I ever could. And that gives me this sort of power over you that I don’t want and that one day, probably soon, you’ll come to resent.” You glance over at her and she looks like she desperately wants to speak but she says nothing. “And I saw it happening, I felt it. But I couldn’t . . .” You tilt your head back toward the ceiling and close your eyes. “We don’t talk in my family, about anything. Definitely not about emotions. So I never knew how to tell you. But I thought if I just said it enough, if I told you I loved you enough that eventually you’d start to understand. That you’d start to believe it.”

“I do believe it, Quinn,” she says softly. You push off of the wall and turn to face her.

“Maybe. But you don’t trust it.” She looks off to the side and tilts her head down and that’s all the confirmation you need. You walk over to sit on the edge of the bed and gesture for her to do the same. She comes to sit beside you, both of you staring straight ahead lost in your own thoughts, and you can’t help but notice that the inches between you suddenly feel like miles.

“It’s not that I don’t trust you,” she finally starts after nearly a minute with a quiet voice, “it’s just that . . . love is complicated. Maybe what we think is love isn’t really, but we’ve never really been with anyone else so how would we know. Or maybe the word love means something completely different to you than it does to me.” You slowly turn your head to look at her.

“It doesn’t.” She looks at you with a small grin before her eyes shift to the floor.

“We’re young, Quinn. Despite how quickly we grew up or how old we feel sometimes, we’re still so young. Even if you do love me, really love me, who’s to say that won’t change in the next few years? Maybe we’ll be completely different people five years down the road. Maybe we’ll fall out just as easily as we fell in.” You watch her as she talks with a steady voice and a look on her face like she’s just stating simple facts and it breaks your heart. You were an idiot for believing those three little words could ever be enough. And now, even after two years, she doesn’t have any idea how you really feel about her. Because you’ve never told her. Because you’ve never known how.

“I don’t think I could ever stop loving you, Rach, even if I tried my hardest. I mean I couldn’t even remember my own name, but somehow some part of me still remembered you.” She takes a deep breath and looks up at you.

“I hear the words but…” she shakes her head and sighs as she shifts her gaze to the wall in front of her. “I’ve always been the one people put up with, as long as I’m useful. Kids pretend to like me in class hoping I’ll help them with the class work or maybe let them cheat off my test. The Glee Club tolerates me because I’ll help them win competitions.” She breathes out a laugh and rolls her eyes. “And some days they can barely even manage to do that.” You know she needs to say all this, to get it all out and finally address her deepest fear. So you wait patiently for her to finish, concentrating on your own breathing to keep from interrupting her with meaningless reassurances. “Even my dads. I mean I know they love me, and they work hard to give me everything I could ever want. They buy me beautiful gifts and get me lessons or training for whatever I want with the best possible teachers around. But they’re always gone. Working late or off on cruises or vacations. They always love me from a distance.”

You close your eyes as the last piece finally clicks into place and you can truly see the last two years from Rachel’s perspective. You wanted to be with her, but only in secret, only if no one else ever knew. Only for a flash of time every now and then and only if it didn’t mess up your real life. How could you possibly expect her to think you were anything different when you’d treated her exactly the same as everyone else.

“And I know that you have real feelings for me and that we lived the way we did because we had to.” She turns to look at you, needing you to hear her. “I know that, I believe it.”

“But…” you whisper quietly. Her eyes shift away from yours and you can see her struggling to find the words as she shrugs.

“But… some part of me can’t help but wonder about after. What happens when we get out of here? When you can be this beautiful, perfect person all the time, for everyone to see. When you take the world by storm and people are throwing themselves at you. When the whole world’s laid out in front of you and you can go anywhere and do anything.”

“Nothing’s gonna change, Rachel. I will love you no matter where we go or what we do.” She looks back at you and her lips twitch up into a placating grin.

“Again, I hear the words but…” she takes a deep breath and her eyes slowly scan your face before she hangs her head. “But that little girl who’s always the last resort just can’t trust that you’d ever pick me with all of that in front of you. Seventeen years of experience has taught me that even the nicest people, people who actually kind of like me, don’t stick around long once something better shows up.”

You take a few moments to let everything she’s said soak in and try to gather your thoughts. You know that this is important, that what you say next could determine exactly how unbearable the next six months will be for the both of you. You try to put the words together in your head, looking for some way to tell her what you haven’t been able to show her all this time. Some way to make sure she can’t help but believe you.

“You’ve always said that when you think about us getting out of Ohio you always picture us in some shitty little New York apartment, barely scraping by, but terribly in love.” She smiles down at the floor and you grin a little yourself. “But I don’t see that, Rach.” You see her smile falter a little but your grin only gets wider. “When I think about you I see the two of us twenty-five years from now at our daughter’s high school graduation.” She slowly raises her head to look at you, the smile cautiously returning to her face and something almost like shock hiding in her eyes. “And we’re both videotaping it because you insisted on having a back-up copy just in case.” She laughs quietly and you smile at her. “And I see us in thirty-five years spoiling the hell out of beautiful grandkids with trips to Broadway and foods that are absolutely terrible for them. I see us buying our first house and arguing over where to send the kids to school or where to go for family vacations.” You twist yourself to the side, bringing your right leg up onto the bed so that you can face her.

“When I look at you I don’t see a few good years, Rachel. I see a life. I may not know who I am, but I know who I want. I always have. Since the first moment I saw you I just knew I had to be by your side.” You see the tears creeping up behind her eyes for just a second before she drops her head as she tries to get control of them. “So even though you’ve always felt like you need me more than I need you . . . even though I’ve always let you feel like that,” you take a breath and try to push your own tears back down, “it just isn’t true.” You see a tear fall and land in her lap and you feel your breath threatening to shake at the sight of it but you force it to level back out.

“And I’ve tried to fight it. I’ve tried not to want you with everything that I am. At first because my parents and their religion told me it was wrong, and then later because I knew you deserved so much better.” She squeezes her eyes shut forcing out two more tears and her hand darts out to grip tightly at your leg. You reach out and lay your hand over hers, your thumb slowly dragging across the back of her hand until her grip finally loosens. “But you . . . you’re like gravity, Rach. No matter how much I struggle or fight like hell to stay away, I always come back to you. You are the only thing that makes me feel . . . . . real.” You reach out with the hand not holding hers and tilt her face up to look at you. “That’s why I did what I did this morning. Because I can lose everyone else, my parents, my sister, my friends, the people at school, I can lose all of them. As long as I get to keep you.”

You bring your hand up to wipe a tear from her cheek and she leans into the touch. As you look at her you suddenly see every single insult and slushie, every time you cut her down in front of a group of people or treated her like something less than human and the next thing you know tears are running down your face and your breath becomes quick and unsteady as you feel yourself start to shake. Before the amnesia you’d spent every day terrified that it was the day you’d go too far, that you’d push her too much and finally lose the only good thing you’d ever had. “I had to do it, Rach. I tried to leave and protect you from me but I – I’m too selfish and . . . . But I can’t h-hurt you anymore, I won’t. It’s hollowing me out and I can’t lose you, Rachel. I just, I can’t –”

“Hey, hey.” She moves your leg behind her and pulls her knees underneath her, scooting closer between your legs until she’s only an inch in front of you. She brings a hand up to either side of your face and starts wiping at your tears like getting rid of the evidence will somehow help the pain. “It’s okay, just breathe.”

“I’m – I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to. It wasn’t su-supposed to –” She shakes her head as another tear travels down her cheek before she leans in and brings her lips against yours. The kiss is slow and steady and almost chaste and you let yourself focus on it completely. You focus on the taste and feel of her lips, on her fingertips slowly dragging up and down on the back of your neck, and you feel your body start to calm down. After a few more seconds she pulls out of the kiss and leans her forehead against your own. She stays there for a moment, eyes closed and breathing slowly, before she finally speaks.

“Listen to me, okay?” She leans back enough to look into your eyes as she slowly starts running a hand through your hair. “You’re not going to lose me. There is nothing you could ever do to lose me. And I’m sorry that I couldn’t see what it was doing to you. That I,” her tears well up again but they don’t fall, just balancing on the edge waiting for her decision, “that I never looked close enough to see.” She tilts her head toward the ceiling and takes a deep breath and when she looks back at you a few seconds later the tears are almost gone again. “But everything is going to be okay now. Because all that stuff you were talking about before, the house and the kids and everything, I want that too.” She smiles at you and you feel relief and the beginnings of peace begin to wash over you as you smile back. “I always have. So we’re going to get through this, okay? Because Rachel Berry always gets what she wants.” She grins again and you laugh quietly as you bring your head down to rest on her shoulder and wrap your arms around her. “We’ll be okay,” she whispers as her hand starts gentle circles on your back. “It’s just six months. We can do this. I promise, Quinn. We’ll be fine.”


	13. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you reading this for the first time the jump from the last chapter to this one will probably be a little jarring. The cliffnote's version is after that last chapter I had over a year's worth of writer's block and this is the only way I could finally find to finish it.

 

**2028**

 

“That is disgusting and wildly inappropriate.”

Matt’s voice snaps Quinn out of the script she’s been buried in for hours.  She hadn’t made it official yet but she knew by the end of the first act that she needed to make this movie and had spent the whole afternoon storyboarding the bigger scenes for backer proposals later on.  She glances up at Matt’s expectant face poking through the open doorway of her office and follows his line of sight to her left hand.  At some point while she had been staring at the script and watching the scenes play out in her head she had produced a quarter from somewhere and had started walking it over the top of her knuckles.  She looks back up at him, her mouth just barely hung open and her eyebrows furrowed together.  He just smirks back at her and says nothing.

“No,” she whispers suspiciously and squints her eyes.

“Mm-hmm.  Yeah, I know what it means.  And you should be ashamed.”  Quinn sighs and hangs her head as he continues his teasing.  “This is a well respected place of business.  You should be setting a professional and dignified example.”

“I’m gonna kill her,” she mutters as she shakes her head.

“I mean, for God’s sake Quinn, there are children working here.”

“He is nineteen,” she responds dryly, knowing that Matt is talking about one of Steve’s new interns, “and that kid says some of the filthiest shit I have ever heard.  During business meetings.”

“Yeah, I’ve been meaning to talk to him about that.”

“Somebody should.  So why exactly are you in my office?”

“Just letting you know I’m heading out, which means you probably should be too.”

“What?  What time is it?” she looks around for her cell phone as he glances down at his watch.

“Nearly six.”

“Shit.”  Quinn hits the power buttons on her electronic tablet and her E-Sketch as she stands up and gathers her things.  “God, she’s gonna kill me.”  Matt laughs at her frantic movements and slightly panicked voice.

“Dude, you are _so_ whipped.”

“Fuck off,” she fires back as she grabs her keys and meets him in the doorway.  “Besides,” she continues as they make their way down the hall, “you are _twice_ as whipped as I am.”

“Uh, no.  I do what I want thank you very much.”  Quinn raises a doubtful eyebrow at him as she pushes open the glass door and steps out into the parking lot.  “As long as I clear it with Sarah first and get home at a decent time,” he finishes quietly behind her.

“Exactly.”

“Hey, I _could_ do whatever I wanted,” he defends as they veer apart to their cars, “I’m just a caring, cooperative, awesome guy who prefers to think of himself and his woman as a _team_ , taking on the world _together_.”  Quinn laughs and gives him a pointed look across the hood of her black SUV before slipping her sunglasses on.

“Yeah, that’s what we all say in the beginning.  Just wait.  Soon you will accept the fact that you are an idiot and it’s best to defer to her for most all the important decisions because you will just fuck them up.”  He looks at her for a moment as he considers this.

“No.  I think that’s probably just you.  You know, because your wife actually _is_ smarter than you.”

“Dick.”  She tosses the quarter still in her hand at his chest and he laughs as he catches it.

“Oh, gross!” he yells as he realizes what he’s holding.  He sticks his tongue out and grimaces as he flings the quarter away from him and Quinn just stares at him curiously.

“What exactly is it you think I _do_ with that quarter?”

“Shhhhh . . . ,” he holds up a finger in her direction, “just shush.”  He closes his eyes for a second and shudders.  Matt is her best guy friend by far but they’ve never been the type to “swap war stories” per se.  Unless they’re drunk, which apparently sometimes leads to things like Quinn giving Matt highly detailed pointers that resulted in Sarah getting him a thirty thousand dollar truck for his last birthday.

“And just because that’s what the quarter thing started out as like _twenty years ago_ doesn’t mean that’s still why I do it.  It’s just an old habit.”

“Mmm-hmm, I bet it is.”  Matt cocks an eyebrow and Quinn rolls her eyes and laughs.

“Whatever.  Goodbye, _Mattie_ ,” she yells as she opens her car door.

“See you Monday, funny girl.”

She starts the car and hits a few buttons on her phone, dropping it into the cup holder and listening to the ringing crackle through her car speakers as she pulls out of the parking lot.

“Make it quick, I’m in a crisis here,” Santana’s voice practically barks through her radio.

“What happened?”

“I went to the bathroom for like _two seconds_ and Ana got into mine and Brit’s makeup _even though she knows she’s not supposed to_ ,” Santana yells the last part away from the phone and Quinn snorts out a quiet laugh.  “And she somehow managed to paint a damn mural across the entire bedroom.”

“Ah,” Quinn says knowingly with a sympathetic nod.  She and Rachel’s ten year old had painted her share of murals back in her day.

“Honestly, if the majority of it hadn’t happened across my very expensive suits, I would mostly just be in awe of her speed and skill,” Santana confesses in a half dazed voice and Quinn laughs again.  “Anyway, what did you need?”

“Nothing really.  Got a new script, probably gonna need some contracts in the next few weeks so I figured I’d go ahead and give you a head’s up.”

“More touchy, feel good crap or actually something decent this time?”  Two years ago she and Rachel had produced _one_ animated movie and Santana has yet to let either of them forget it.

“No, Jackass.  It’s very dark and gritty and nearly everyone dies.  It’s right up your alley.”

“And…?” she asks after a moment and Quinn sighs.

“ _And_ there _may_ possibly be a very _low-key_ car chase which _might_ include a _small_ explosion.”

“Now you’re talking.  And “wanky” to that “up my alley” comment, by the way.”  Quinn rolls her eyes.  “I’m booked most of next week but I can probably fit you in sometime over the weekend or early the week after.”

“That’s fine.  It’s still in the very early stages so I probably won’t need them for a few weeks at least.”

“Dios Mio,” Santana whispers after a few seconds and Quinn hears the distinct sounds of her cell phone being dropped.

“Santana?”  She cocks an eyebrow at the dashboard and waits.  A few more seconds pass in silence before she finally hears rustling and Santana’s quiet voice comes over the line.

“She got the Dolce, Quinn.  The _Dolce_.  Is nothing sacred?”  Quinn stifles a laugh behind her hand.

“Not to a four year old,” she finally manages.

“I – I – I gotta go.”  The line clicks and Quinn laughs and shakes her head as music from the local radio station takes over her speakers.

 

***************

 

As Quinn pulls into her driveway she takes a moment to admire the quaint brick house.  Two stories tall, but no more than 5,000 square feet; landscaped well enough, but not a twenty thousand dollar jungle; no flag on the porch or decorations on the lawn, but a small pink bike laying on its side by the garage and the faint sounds of some motorized toy being driven around the back yard.  As she puts her SUV in park just in front of the garage and kills the engine she takes just a second to let the feeling of _home_ wash over her.  She had expected it to fade over time, to become too jaded to really feel it eventually, but ten years later the sight of this house causes that warm feeling to settle in her bones and a smile to slowly stretch across her face just as much as it ever did.  She still has moments every now and then when she can’t quite believe this is her life, that all the brutal, painful shit in her childhood somehow led up to all of this.

As she finally steps out of the car and hears that tiny motor coming closer her smile grows.  She waits eagerly for the little black plastic four-wheeler to appear around the side of the house, the two-foot tall driver grinning wildly under a mop of messy blonde hair.  His face somehow gets even brighter when he spots her, laughing and waving as he zooms past to the end of the yard.  She laughs with him as she hears him coming back up the driveway and turns to greet him.  He pulls the four-wheeler to a quick stop a few feet away and nearly trips off of it with his need to get to her immediately.  She tucks her keys into her back pocket and slides her sunglasses up onto her head with a smile as she leans down; arms out and ready to turn his running hug into a playful toss in the air like always.  He giggles as she catches him and hugs him close. 

He’s not quite five years old yet and has always been a little small for his age, but as she wraps her arms around him and sways him from side to side she realizes that one day soon she won’t be able to toss him around so easily.  One day she won’t be able to pick him up and carry him inside when he falls.  One day he won’t want her to anyways.  One day he’ll roll his eyes at the sound of her coming through the front door instead of running to her with a smile like he’s been waiting for her all day.  One day he’ll have his own home and his own kids to toss into the air as they come running to greet him with smiles and laughter.  She takes a deep breath and tightens her grip on him for just a second, planting a kiss somewhere in his mess of hair.  As his arms loosen around her neck she shifts him around to settle on her hip instead of setting him back on the ground, not quite wanting to let him go just yet.

“Hi, Mommy!”  He darts in to give her a peck on the cheek and pulls back with such a satisfied smile that she can’t help but laugh lightly as she kisses his forehead.

“Hey, buddy.  Did you have a good day today?”  He suddenly gets a very purposefully sad look on his face and slumps his shoulders as he sighs.

“No.”  He drops his head and she tries to match his solemn tone and hid her own grin.

“No?”

“No.”  He shakes his head at the ground and she barely manages to stop her giggle from escaping.

“So you didn’t have a good day?”

“Nope.  I had an _awesome_ day!”  He throws his head up as he yells it and bounces from side to side and she laughs as she tries to keep a steady hold on him.  “I got to have _two_ cookies today after lunch, and Lexie showed me how to make an _airplane_ out of _paper_ , and I hit a bump in the back yard and went so high _all four wheels went off the ground!_ ”  Quinn experiences half a second of sheer panic before she remembers that his little four-wheeler tops out at about fifteen miles per hour and is so damn heavy she can barely even move the thing and then just smiles at his overactive imagination.

“Well I believe you’re right, Jack, that _does_ sound like an awesome day.”  He nods enthusiastically and grins up at her.  “So where are the girls?”

“Inside; Lexie’s doing homework and Mama’s making some weird new stuff for dinner.”  Quinn smiles to herself knowing that Rachel’s probably been in the kitchen for an hour mumbling to herself and trying to have a genuine conversation with some cookbook about why it’s lying to her.

“Weird new stuff?  Oh no.”  Quinn’s expression turns serious and Jack’s follows suit.  “You know what I bet it is?” she asks with a smirk and his little eyes twinkle with anticipation.  She leans back and looks around as if to make sure no one’s listening before leaning back in close to her son’s face.

“Tofurkey!” they both yell and make over exaggerated noises of complete disgust.  Rachel has never actually made Tofurkey, or even suggested they eat it a day in her life, but it was a word that Jack had found highly entertaining when he was younger and it has since become one of their many silly routines.

“What do you say tomorrow we go out to lunch, just you and me, and we get some meaty, super delicious ribs?”

“Awesome!” he yells and flails again.  Quinn laughs and kisses him on the cheek before finally setting him back on the ground.

“Ten more minutes, buddy,” Quinn yells after him, “and then come inside okay.”

“Kay,” he yells over his shoulder as he runs to climb on the four-wheeler and start it up again.  She shakes her head as she turns to make her way toward the house. She picks up Lexie’s bike and rolls it into the garage standing it up by the stairs before she heads inside.

She lays her keys and sunglasses on the table by the door and makes her way down the hall past the bonus room and toward the living room.  Lexie is lying across the couch on her stomach with a textbook and a spiral notebook open in front of her, propped up on her elbows with her legs lazily swinging back and forth in the air behind her.  As Quinn leans against the doorway and takes a few seconds to just watch her daughter she’s hit with that nostalgic, left-behind feeling again.  Lexie’s long brown hair is pulled back in a loose ponytail away from her face and her black square rimmed glasses have slid halfway down her nose.  She’s got on a t-shirt and a pair of old yoga pants that barely cover the knees of legs that are sure to be as long as her mother’s in a year or two. 

Rachel had spent months searching for a sperm donor that not only met her many requirements in health, talent, intellect, and character, but that was a little taller with somewhat prominent cheekbones and had blond hair and dark green eyes.  “If I can’t actually have your baby, Quinn then I’ll be damned if we settle for anything less than your long lost twin brother,” she had said.  “Rachel Berry never gives anything less than one hundred percent.  And she always does it better than everyone else,” she had added with a smirk, causing Quinn to laugh and kiss her until they both forgot about donors and doctors and the futile longing that they could just have a baby simply out of their fierce love for each other like so many other people.

Unfortunately, despite Rachel’s best efforts, Alexandria has looked exactly like Rachel since the day she was born.  Her soft, wavy brown hair is just a little lighter, and her big soulful amber eyes have just a hint of green in them, but physically she’s nearly a carbon copy of her mother.  Quinn would never have it any other way.  Lexie only just turned ten three months ago, but as she pushes her glasses up closer to her eyes and then settles them back into place with a scrunch of her nose, chewing on her bottom lip as she copies something into her notebook, she looks _so much_ like Rachel that Quinn’s heart squeezes in her chest. 

For just a second the room shifts around her and she’s back in their cheap, drafty, wonderful apartment during their freshman year of college.  She’s sitting in their worn out, over-sized armchair with her laptop cursing her Personal Finance professor and his insanely long-winded word problems under her breath, while Rachel lays on her stomach on the couch across the room with a book of poetry and a spiral notebook.  Her legs are hovering in the air behind her, feet crossed at the ankles and perpetually swaying or bouncing, the only reminder of the constant energy buzzing through the smaller girl, always ready to be harnessed and unleashed at a moment’s notice.  She squints at the poem from behind her glasses genuinely trying to decipher the deep and powerful meaning behind the words as her teeth alternate between chewing on her bottom lip and the end of her pen.  Quinn ignores her tedious class work for a few seconds in favor of watching the girl in front of her.  Rachel raises an eyebrow at the book and gives a small helpless shrug.  She lets out a long, quiet sigh as she pushes her glasses up her nose and then scrunches them back into place as she starts writing and Quinn falls in love with her for the tenth time that day.

She remembers it like it was yesterday, can still summon that giddy feeling she’d gotten every morning for weeks at waking up to find Rachel beside her.  But at the same time it somehow feels like a lifetime ago, like a completely different story than the one she’s living now.  Quinn shakes herself out of the memory as she pushes off the doorway and crosses the room toward a daughter that’s growing up a lot faster than she’d like.

“Hey, Mom,” Lexie says casually as she glances up at her.

“Hello, baby girl,” Quinn responds as she leans over to kiss the top of her head.  “I heard you taught your brother how to make a paper airplane today.”

“Yeah, some of the boys were making them in class today and I thought he might like it so…” she trails off as she scribbles down more notes.  Quinn finds herself thanking whoever’s in charge for what must be the thousandth time for every sweet and decent part of Rachel that made its way into Lexie.  She knows that Jack can be more than a little loud and rambunctious at times but Lexie has never been anything but loving and patient with him.  Quinn thinks back to herself at Lexie’s age; yelling at Rachel and making fun of her, pushing her to the ground at recess under Daddy’s orders, and she makes a mental note to do something extravagant and insanely romantic for the woman that’s somehow managed to put up with her for all these years before she completely buries herself in the new project.

“So,” she starts as she crouches down beside her daughter.

“Hold on, give me one minute,” she mutters as her pen quickly fills the rest of the page in front of her, her eyes glued to her textbook, barely even glancing down at her notes as she writes them.  Quinn knows that _technically_ it’s not a talent that Lexie “got from her”, but it’s one they share nonetheless, and the corner of her mouth lifts into a grin at the sight.

“Quinn, is that you?” Rachel’s voice filters out from the kitchen, “How delightful that you’ve finally decided to join us.”  Lexie snickers under her breath and Quinn shoots her a glare as she stands and slowly starts moving toward the kitchen.

“Alright, saved by the crazier of your two mothers –”

“I heard that!”

“Love you!” Quinn yells in the general direction of the kitchen before turning her attention back to her daughter, “– but I’ve got a question for you later.”  Quinn smiles at the girl who rolls her eyes even as she grins back.

“Yeah, yeah, I know.”

“Hello, gorgeous,” Quinn says loudly as she enters the kitchen.  “The boy tells me you’ve been in here yelling angrily at the food for the last half hour.”

“I have done nothing of the sort, thank you,” Rachel throws over her shoulder from where she stands in front of the stove on the other side of the kitchen.

“More like forty-five minutes,” Quinn hears from the living room and smiles in victory as Rachel gasps.

“Traitor!” she hisses at the wall separating her from her betrayer.

Quinn laughs and takes a moment to just stop and let her life sink in.  She’s had more than her fair share of bad shit over the last thirty-four years.  And her life is still far from perfect.  Her daughter huffs and shuts down because her mothers “just don’t understand her”, her son throws tantrums that can last for hours, and she and Rachel both let their stress or exhaustion control their words more than they should.  But more often than not her house is filled with laughter and happiness instead of silence and expectation.  It’s more than she had ever even let herself hope for back in Ohio.

“Anyway, it’s almost ready.”  Rachel voice snaps her back to reality.  She watches her as she moves a pot off of the stove and peeks into the oven.  She’s wearing a white tank top and her favorite pair of Quinn’s old Cheerios sweats and her hair is clipped on top of her head with just a few strands falling loose to frame her face.  When she spins around and smiles at her Quinn’s heart stops for just a second.  Rachel tilts her head and stares at her curiously as she starts toward her.  Quinn feels a faint echo of that nervous excitement that always coursed through her body as a teenager at the mere sight of the other girl.  She shakes her head with a smile as Rachel finally reaches her.  Rachel doesn’t say anything, just squints her eyes as she tries to decipher the expression on her wife’s face.

“Hello gorgeous,” Quinn whispers sincerely as she brushes a strand of hair behind her ear.  Rachel smiles and her eyes dart back and forth between Quinn’s looking for something.  When she finally finds it her smiles grows to something dazzling.

“There’s my Quinn,” she whispers back and leans forward to bring their lips together.  It doesn’t feel just as magical as their first kiss or better than all the rest or even more meaningful than usual.  But the sight and sound and feel of Rachel still brings her that feeling of peace and contentment like nothing else can and Quinn thinks as long as this beautiful girl in her arms will keep letting her kiss her for the rest of their lives then she couldn’t really ask for much more.  Rachel sighs happily as she pulls away and smiles up at Quinn before going back to the stove.

“So,” Quinn starts as she moves to the counter beside Rachel, leaning back against it and watching her work, “did you get a chance to read any of that script I sent you this morning?”

“I only got through about half of it while Jack was taking his nap, but I love it so far.  If the rest of it’s even half as decent then I’m in.  And I was thinking that Lisa would be perfect for the lead.”

"Lisa who?"

"Um... shit," Rachel mutters with a confused frown.  "You know who I'm talking about.  She played my younger sister a few years ago in, um..." she scrunches her brows together for a moment, " _Willingly."_

"Adams?”

“Yes!”

“No,” Quinn breathes out with a shake of her head.  Rachel raises an eyebrow at her.

“Why not?  You saw _Land of Ashes_ ; you know she’s got the chops to pull it off.  Plus, I happen to know she's looking for something to establish her as a more dramatic actress so she can get offered something besides another rom com every now and then.”

“Yeah, but I don’t know if – wait, how far did you read?”

“Um, Rennie just agreed to meet them so they’re on their way to the warehouse.”

“Ah.  Well a few scenes after that some . . . _rough_ shit is gonna go down.  The kind of stuff people are _not_ going to want to see happen to perky, adorable Lisa Adams.  Hell, I don’t even know that her agent would _let_ her read for it even if she wanted to.”

“What?  What the hell happens?”

“You’ll have to read it and find out,” Quinn singsongs with a smirk and Rachel rolls her eyes and sighs.

“God, you’re worse than a writer.”  Quinn gasps and brings a hand up to her chest.

“That’s harsh.”

“And accurate.”

“Anyways,” Quinn says pointedly as she crosses to the refrigerator for a bottle of water, “you know who I was thinking of for the cracked out, misguided mother?”

“Jennifer.”

“Exactly.”  Quinn flips the back porch light off and on a few times as she passes it signaling to Jack that it’s time to come in.

“I e-mailed her earlier.  I said I had a role I knew she’d love and for her to check her schedule and get back to me.”

“That’s why I keep you around.”  Quinn kisses the top of Rachel’s head on her way to the bowl of pasta sitting on the counter beside her.  “And for the food,” she adds as she picks out a diced tomato and tosses it in her mouth.

“Well that makes two points for me, meanwhile the only reason I keep you around is for sex.  And, not to brag, but I’m getting to be not too shabby at taking care of that myself.”  Rachel turns off the stovetop and smirks at her as she carries the last pot to the counter.  Quinn grins and snorts out a laugh.

“Is that a fact?”

“I’m very talented,” she says with a shrug as she reaches up to grab four plates from the cabinet.

“Don’t I know it,” Quinn mutters and Rachel grins slyly as she opens a drawer and picks through the utensils.  “You know,” Quinn slides up behind her and lightly grabs her hips, “I was thinking about you at work today.”

“Oh really?”

“Uh-huh.”  She presses in closer to her wife placing a soft kiss behind her ear.  “As a matter of fact,” she whispers, “I got _caught_ thinking about you because _somebody_ told Matt about the quarter thing.”

“That blabbermouth,” Rachel sighs.  “I swear he’s worse than a female sometimes.”

“He was relentless about it.  And I have no doubt that this is going to cause me many embarrassing problems in the future.”

“And why is that?” Rachel smirks as she turns around in Quinn’s arms.

“Because I fiddle with a damn quarter while I’m sitting behind the camera on sets all the time.”  Rachel grins and raises an eyebrow.  “Because it’s become an old habit,” Quinn says pointedly.  “Pervert.”

“Other pervert.”

“My point is I see an abundant amount of poorly disguised pointing and giggling in my future.  And that’s just the best case scenario in which Matt keeps it to himself.”  Rachel chuckles quietly with a smile as Quinn leans closer to whisper in her ear.  “And to that end, I propose that some strenuous and enthusiastic recompense and remuneration is in order.”  Quinn glances at her wife’s face out of the corner of her eye and smirks as Rachel takes a deep breath and carefully gnaws her bottom lip.

“Gross.” 

Both women spin around at the sound of their daughter’s voice from the kitchen doorway and quickly step away from each other, looking the very picture of two kids caught trying to sneak in desert before dinner.  They sigh as their heartbeats begin to slowly level back out.  Quinn grimaces and shoots a halfhearted glare at the younger girl as she covertly raises her right hand to her wife’s ass in defiance.  Rachel snorts out a laugh and swats her arm away, effectively ruining Quinn’s plot for rebellion.

“I am standing here beside myself,” Jack says from his position at his sister’s left in the doorway.  Quinn throws back her head and laughs as the other two roll their eyes.

“Nice one son!” she finally manages once she gets her laughter under control.  “Air five.”  She and Jackson both raise their right hands and wave them in the air mimicking a high-five motion.  Lexie and Rachel exchange a look and a shake of their heads at the blondes’ antics.

“You know he has absolutely no idea why that’s funny so he’s just going to keep saying it over and over for the next month,” Rachel says quietly as she grabs the plates and utensils from the counter and hands them to Quinn.

“Yes.  And it will be hilarious every time.  Oh, and I’m totally adding that solo talent of yours to my fight list.”  Quinn shifts the dinnerware around in her arms until she’s holding all of it in her left hand, slaps Rachel on the ass with a smirk and a wink, and heads toward the table.  Rachel just smiles and shakes her head at the fifteen year old she’s married to as she grabs the food from the counter and joins her family.

 

 

***************

 

Quinn raises her arms and stretches as the credits roll across the screen.  It had been Jack’s turn to choose what to watch after dinner so of course they had all silently suffered through yet another episode of _Archie in the Attic_.

“Well that was thrilling as always,” Rachel says from her right with a smile and Lexie groans from her spot stretched out across her mothers.  Rachel glares down at her daughter’s head in her lap and the girl just raises an eyebrow.

“That show is ridiculous.”

“Be nice,” Quinn scolds lightly and swats at the ankles draped over her thighs.  Rachel looks down at Jack, snuggled into her right side grinning at the screen completely oblivious to the conversation around him.

“Come on,” Rachel says through a laugh as she ruffles his hair, “time for bed sweetie.”

“Can I tell you guys something first?” he asks excitedly as he grins up at his mother.

“Sure.”

“Well, it’s for Lexie really.”  The boy leans down to bring his face closer to hers and just stares at her for a few seconds.  “It’s happening.”  He suddenly grabs the pillow beside him and swings it completely around his body to hit his sister square in the face.  A few months back Jack had tried to start a friendly pillow fight with Lexie, who had _not_ been in the mood for it _at all_ , and it had resulted in a long night for all parties involved.  Quinn and Rachel had then sat him down and explained that he couldn’t just start a pillow fight with someone without telling them it’s happening first, and the words had gotten mixed up in the translation somewhere.  Since then the phrase “it’s happening” coming out of their son’s mouth had been as good as the bang of a starting gun.

Lexie barely even takes a second to assess the situation before she grabs the pillow lying behind her and swings it around to smack her brother in the chest.

“The game’s afoot!” Quinn yells.  She picks up Lexie’s feet and tosses them behind her as she stands and dives for the loveseat three feet to her left.  She grabs both pillows there and stands to face her family, slowly spinning a pillow in each hand as if she’s duel-wielding katanas in a Tarantino film.  Lexie is standing on top of the coffee table holding a pillow defensively and trying to keep an eye on all three of her opponents at once.  Jackson is ducked completely behind the recliner on the other side of the couch, one eye peeking around the side of it.  And Rachel is standing in front of the couch weaponless and glancing around frantically.

“Not fair!” Rachel yells pointing at Quinn.  “Give me one!”

“There’s no share-sies in war, Rachel!”  Quinn darts past the coffee table nailing Lexie in the head and hip on the way before taking cover around the corner.

“Well in that case I’m pretty sure we’re even for the whole quarter thi –” Rachel is cut off by one of Quinn’s pillows being quickly but gently thrown at her.  “Thank you, honey,” Rachel says sweetly.

“Dictator,” Quinn mumbles around the corner.

“Tyrant,” Rachel fires back.

“President!” Jack yells as he darts forward and lands a hit square in his sister’s gut.  She spins and grazes the back of his head before tackling him into the loveseat.

“How did he even know that word went with our words?” Rachel throws over her shoulder as she slowly advances on the tangled mess of her children.

“Because he’s brilliant.  You’re _welcome_ ,” Quinn emphasizes the last word with a mid-air smack to the back of Rachel’s head as she uses the coffee table as a springboard to launch herself past Rachel and toward the kids.  “Boom, boom!” she quickly nails them both before circling around behind the couch, holding her pillow up in victory.  “Owned!”  Her entire family stops to glare at her and she smirks.

“Diversionary tactics!” Lexie yells. 

“Jack, left flank,” Rachel instructs as she quickly taps the boy’s arm.  Jackson has no idea what half of the words being yelled mean but he knows the tone in his mother and sister’s voices means something awesome is about to happen so he hurries to follow after Rachel.

Quinn watches as Rachel and Jack circle around the couch on her right side.

“Wait a minute now,” Quinn pleads with her hands in front of her defensively.  She just barely has enough time to register Lexie moving out of the corner of her eye and turns her head just in time to receive a pillow to the face as the girl leaps off the back of the couch.  She’s still slightly frozen from the shock, head tilted toward the ceiling, when the assault on her right side starts.  At some point she’s tackled to the ground and her pillow is wrenched from her hand.

“Traitors!  My own children!” she yells between blows.

“Alright guys, I think she’s had enough,” Rachel finally says and the kids get in a few halfhearted parting shots before crawling off of their mother.  “Jack, say goodnight to Mommy.”

“Night Mommy.”  He leans over to kiss her on the cheek and she reciprocates.

“Night buddy.”  The kids head upstairs to get ready for bed and Rachel extends a hand to Quinn to help her up.  “They turned on me,” she whispers with shock and Rachel giggles, “at such a younger age than I thought they would.”

“Drama queen,” Rachel says with an eye roll.  Quinn grabs a pillow and lightly smacks at her wife.

“Offensive.”

“Your mom is offensive.”

“Your face is offensive.”  Rachel gasps playfully and Quinn grins.  “Well that worked out nicely.”

“Come on, dork.”  Rachel grabs her hand and pulls her up off the ground.  By the time they get the living room straightened up Lexie is coming back down the stairs with freshly brushed hair and teeth.  “I’m gonna go put him to bed and leave you ladies to it,” Rachel says with a smile and kisses Quinn on the cheek.

Quinn smiles at her daughter as they both head to the couch.  Lexie sits in the middle, tucking her legs underneath her and giving Quinn her full attention.  Quinn takes her seat next to her, crossing her left leg over her right and resting her right arm across the back of the couch as she turns toward her.  She takes a deep breath and tucks a wayward curl back behind the girl’s ear.  She bites back the small wave of sadness as she remembers that this new script is going to keep her away from her family a lot more than she’d like for the next few months.

“So,” she starts with a grin, “how was your day, Lexie Rae?”  Lexie rolls her eyes at the old rhyme she’s heard nearly every night of her life, but she follows it up with a genuine smile and Quinn breathes out a quiet laugh as she smiles back.

“It was okay.  Mrs. Brownfield told a really funny math joke this morning and I meant to write it down so I could tell you guys but I forgot.  Mr. Murphy just let us talk and hang out most of the class since it’s Friday.  And Becky got a haircut.  I told her it was cute but it really makes her look like a boy.  Like even up close she really looks like a boy.” 

“Oh, it can’t be that bad.”

“No, it is.”  Quinn laughs and shakes her head.  “How was work?”

“It was good actually.  I found a new movie today I think.”

“Is it good?” Lexie asks with genuine interest.

“Yeah, it’s really good.  If we can do it right I think a lot of people are really going to like it.”

“Can I see it?”

“Not even a little bit, no.”  Lexie sighs and frowns.  Quinn laughs and pulls her arm around her daughter’s shoulders pulling her into her side and kissing the top of her head.  “Sorry, baby girl.”

They sit in silence for a few seconds, Lexie leaning into her mother with her head resting against her chest, before the younger girl finally speaks.

“Is it gonna be a long movie?”  Quinn knows this is Lexie’s way of asking her “how long are you going to be gone?” and she tightens her arm around her.

“A few months probably.  But it will be a long while before we actually start filming.  You’ll probably be out of school for the summer by then so maybe you guys can come with me for a bit.”

“That would be cool,” Lexie says quietly.  She wraps her arms around her mother and fully settles against her and Quinn wraps her other arm around the small girl.  Quinn sighs, slowly dragging her hand up and down her daughter’s back and she kisses her forehead.

“I love you, Lexie Rae,” she whispers into the girl’s hair.

“I know Mom.  I love you too.”  They stay like that for a minute, both of them just enjoying the closeness that hasn’t always come easy to the two of them, until Rachel comes back downstairs.

 

***************

 

Two hours later the kids are asleep and the house is quiet as Quinn and Rachel finally get themselves ready for bed.

“So have you officially decided you’re gonna do it?  The movie?” Rachel asks from in front of her dresser across the room.

“I think so,” Quinn answers.  “I mean I haven’t actually _made_ anything official but I want to.”  She stops taking off her makeup for a second to glance at her wife’s reflection in the vanity mirror in front of her.  “Why?  You think I shouldn’t?”  Rachel turns around and meets Quinn’s eyes in the mirror as she walks toward her rubbing lotion onto her hands and up her arms.

“No, I was just asking.  I like it.  I think it’ll be really good.”  She brings her hands up to rest on Quinn’s shoulders and smiles at her.  “And I know that no one else could do it half as well as you.”  She leans down and kisses Quinn’s temple before turning and heading for the bed.  Quinn smiles as she watches her reflection go and then goes back to removing her eye shadow.

“I really love the story,” Quinn says a few minutes later as she stands and walks to the bed.  “I’ve already storyboarded like five or six scenes.”

“What?” Rachel glances up from her Kindle to look at Quinn as she climbs into bed.  “Why are you storyboarding so early?”

“Well I figured I’d get Sean to set me up a meeting with Ethan next week,” Quinn says as she grabs her own Kindle from the bedside table and checks her email, “and you know him, he’s so much easier to convince with a pretty picture than with a well worded speech.”  Rachel laughs quietly and goes back to her reading. 

Quinn types out a few quick email responses and checks her schedule for next week.  She turns the tablet off and sets it back on the table and then turns her attention to Rachel.  She slowly leans toward her, trying to read the screen in her hands.

“Stop it,” Rachel instructs without looking up.  Quinn’s eyes dart back and forth between the screen and Rachel’s face a few times before she speaks.

“I can’t.  What part are you at?  Isn’t it awesome?  Did the thing with the bitches and the you know what happen yet?”  Rachel sighs and shakes her head.  She puts her tablet away and lays her glasses down on top of it.

“You’re like a five year old,” she says as she turns back to her wife.  Quinn just shrugs and smiles.  Rachel rolls her eyes and laughs.  She leans over to give Quinn a quick kiss before settling down to go to sleep. 

Quinn reaches over to turn off the lamp on her side of the bed but stops as one of the pictures on her bedside table catches her attention.  It’s an old picture of her and Rachel, hidden back behind a handful of other pictures of her friends and family.  She grabs the picture instead, leaving the light on for now, and brings it with her as she settles in beside Rachel who immediately curls into her side.

“I love that picture,” Rachel hums out quietly as she brings an arm across Quinn’s waist.  Quinn wraps her right arm behind Rachel and pulls her a little closer.

“Me too,” she whispers and presses her lips against Rachel’s hair. 

It’s one of Quinn’s favorite pictures of the two of them, and for years it had been her _only_ picture of them.  They’d taken it a few weeks after they started dating.  They were in their old clearing and it had taken Quinn forever to prop her camera up on a low standing branch and then angle it properly.  She had rushed back to Rachel, standing behind her and throwing her arms around her waist as they both posed.  After a few seconds of awkward silence from the device Quinn had turned her head and whispered something in Rachel’s ear and Rachel had laughed and Quinn had smiled and the flash finally went off.  They had both forgotten long ago what it was that Quinn had said or anything else that happened that day, but they can still remember the feeling.  Being fifteen and so in love and fighting like hell to keep it.

During high school Quinn had kept the picture hidden in a frame behind a picture of the Glee Club with their first trophy, knowing that the last thing her parents would investigate in her room would be anything about “that ridiculous club”.  And whenever things started to seem bleak and pointless, she would look at that picture and try to feel the happiness that they felt then.  It was her constant reminder of why they were doing things the way they were and it almost always helped her sleep a little easier.  Now it serves as a reminder of the crazy story that is ‘her and Rachel’ and how far they’d had to come to get where they are now.

Quinn puts the picture back in its spot and finally clicks off the lamp.  She settles back in the bed and just lies there for a while, holding Rachel and letting old memories flip through her mind.

Years ago, after their first movie had gotten so much more attention than any of them could’ve imagined and important people had started learning their names, a magazine had done a piece on the two of them.  “So what’s the real story behind Rachel Berry and Quinn Fabray?” the interviewer had asked them.  “How did you meet?  Who asked who out?  We want all the juicy details.”  Rachel and Quinn had just looked at each other and laughed nervously.

“Well,” Rachel started, “we met when we were ten and we knew straight away that we kind of liked each other.”

“But then my parents forbid me to have anything to do with her,” Quinn filled in, “so for a long time after that we were kind of enemies.”

“Then during our freshman year of high school we started hanging out again and eventually dating.”

“Which was still completely forbidden so we had to do it in secret.”

“While still putting on this show of being at war for everyone else.  Then our junior year Quinn had a wreck and got amnesia.”

“Yeah, that was not very fun.  But Rachel reminded me who I was.”  They smiled at each other and Quinn reached over to lace their fingers together.

“Then everyone found out and Quinn got sent to a boarding school across the country.”

“Then I moved back on my eighteenth birthday and my father kicked me out and disowned me so I moved in with Rach and her dads.”

“And a week later we went on our first actual date.”

The interviewer had just stared at them with her mouth hung slightly open for a few seconds before she finally started laughing and said, “Well I guess that’s what I get for asking an actress and a director to tell me a story.”

Needless to say, ever since then when people ask them how they met they usually just answer with an “Oh, we were high school sweethearts.”  Their life together is so different now that Quinn rarely even thinks about how it used to be all those years ago.

“Do you ever think about what could’ve happened, if things had gone another way?” Quinn asks quietly.  “If I hadn’t remembered.  Or if I’d let you walk out the door that day in our apartment freshman year.”  Rachel hums quietly and takes a deep breath.

“Sometimes.”  The hand draped across Quinn’s hip starts fidgeting with the hem of her shirt and Quinn tightens her grip around Rachel.  “But as we get older a part of me knows that even if you’d never remembered or any one of a thousand other things had happened, we’d still be here.”  Quinn smiles as her left hand slowly traces up and down Rachel’s arm.  “It might’ve taken us a little longer, things might be completely different, but we’d still be here in the end.

“You think so?”

“Mm-hmm.  It’s like there’s this core, fundamental part of me that needs you just to function.  Like when I get a little stressed with the kids or overwhelmed at work, it just takes one look from you, or one touch, one phone call, and I remember who I am.  I can stop and breathe and be me again.  For as long as I can remember you’ve been nearly as big a part of me as I am.  I wouldn’t have been able to stay away from that for very long.”  Quinn takes a deep breath and presses a kiss to Rachel’s forehead.  “Plus, we both know you couldn’t last a _week_ without _me_.”  They both laugh at that.

“Whatever, I could totally last a week.”  Rachel lifts her head enough to look at Quinn and raise an eyebrow.

“You had me Fed-Ex your sunglasses to you in North Dakota last year.”  Quinn opens her mouth to speak but then closes it again when she comes up blank.  “Mm-hmm,” Rachel says with a smirk and lays her head back down.

“We were in the middle of nowhere and it was crazy bright,” Quinn finally says and she feels Rachel breathe out a quiet laugh against her skin.  “And I love those sunglasses, they are possibly the best item ever crafted by human hands.  The visibility is fantastic and it’s like the Baby Jesus himself is personally shielding you from the sun’s blinding rays.”  Rachel laughs loudly and swats at Quinn’s hip.

“Oh my god, you are _such a dork_.”  Quinn smiles and laughs along with her.  A few minutes later once their giggles have died down and Rachel is almost asleep her words wash back over Quinn.

“I really couldn’t, you know?” she whispers.  “Last a week without you.  Not even a day really.  I never could, not since the first time I saw you.”  Rachel squeezes her a little tighter and presses a kiss to her chest.

“I know baby,” she mumbles tiredly.  “I know you better than you know yourself, remember?” 

“Yeah."  Quinn smiles up at the ceiling as she closes her eyes and finally starts to give in to her drowsiness.  "I remember.”


End file.
